READING ROME FROM THE FARTHER SHORE: "AENEID" 6 IN THE AUGUSTAN URBAN LANDSCAPE

This paper explores how Aeneid 6 might reflect and inform ancient audiences' responses to Augustan architecture. Aeneas' encounter with Daedalus' temple at Cumae and vision of future Romans in the Underworld, as narrated by Vergil, raise questions of aesthetic and historical judgment....

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Vergilius (1959) 2014-01, Vol.60, p.85-116
Main Author: Pandey, Nandini B.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Architecture
Civil wars
Epics
Heroes
Mausoleums
Poetry
Processions
Statues
Temples
Urban landscape
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Summary:This paper explores how Aeneid 6 might reflect and inform ancient audiences' responses to Augustan architecture. Aeneas' encounter with Daedalus' temple at Cumae and vision of future Romans in the Underworld, as narrated by Vergil, raise questions of aesthetic and historical judgment. These episodes also model interpretive strategies that encourage Vergil's readers to revisit contemporary monuments, notably the Palatine Temple of Apollo and the Forum Augustum, with a critical eye toward their presentation of Roman history. In my reading, audiences exercised considerable interpretive power over the physical city as well as the epics literary landscape, questioning the extent to which the princeps was able to turn Rome into a coherent urban narrative that controlled their paths and perceptions.
ISSN:0506-7294