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Before we turn to book four and Dido and
her story, I thought we'd take a step back

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from books one through three and look at
two specific themes that have emerged here

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that are interesting contrasts with the
material that we've seen before and a nice

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window into what happens, with the Roman,
version of ancient myth.

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We've already talked about both of these,
but I wanted to take some time to focus in

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on them.
I'm going to talk about Pietas as a

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central hero for, central value for what a
hero ought to be, and I wanna talk about

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the concept of teleology as a driving
force behind, a historical thrust.

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The, idea of pietas shows up as a
definitive marker of what Aeneas is all

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about.
We've translated this as dutiful, I think

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that's as good a single English word as
we're going to find, but it's much more

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than just being simply dutiful.
Pietas has an etymological with an English

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word piety, and yes, indeed, it means
showing due reverence to the gods, pietas

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does.
But it means, in addition to this sense of

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dutifulness and showing piety, it means
all the things that a Roman would want to

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see in a Roman man.
It is.

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A sense of follow through, commitment to
getting something done a sense of appeal

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to the broader responsibilities of a
person who takes on a leadership role, who

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needs to make sure everybody is brought
along, no one is over looked.

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Pietas talks about doing the difficult
correct thing as opposed to the easy quick

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out thing, carrying through with your
promises, being honorable, all of these

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things are built into the idea of pietas.
It's impossible to be a great Roman

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without exhibiting this and aspiring to
it.

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Now, this is a very different central
virtue than what we saw with Odysseus.

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Remember, for him it was polytropos.
Odysseus is able to get out of any jam

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that he gets, he finds himself getting
into.

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Through whatever strength, whatever guile
he has to use, he'll get himself out of

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trouble.
A Roman might look at that.

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Kind of cultural valuation, say, well what
did he do getting into trouble in the

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first place?
He shouldn't have been so swashbuckling

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and telling lies and being all sneaky like
that.

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The Romans, in fact, don't hold up an idea
of being polytropos, any Roman equivalent,

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as some of centerpiece of what they want
their hero to be.

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Instead, the new centerpiece of what a
hero's going to be all about is this

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notion of being dutiful.
So or, sorry, Aeneas shows this in his,

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relationship with the divinities.
He's got a relationship with his own god,

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the Penates, that allows him to exhibit
his pietas.

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He shows it in his relationship with his
subordinates.

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He shows duty to them.
And honor, he's honorable to them.

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He tries to bring them along.
He also shows it when he is constantly

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subordinating his own individual desires
to the larger needs of the society.

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This is also built in to the idea of
pietas, which says that your own

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individual interest is only one small
piece of the world where a larger

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corporate social interest is much more
important.

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The similies of bees and ants things that
we've already seen in Homeric times become

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flavored with a new a newly admirable
quality in Virgil's text.

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They are, markers of this sense of group
dynamic and an ability to work together in

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groups, to get great things done.
Romans are wonderful at that and they're

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rightly proud of their ability to do such
things.

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When Aeneas is engaged in his making of
boundaries, and building of walls, this is

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further an act of pietas. It is a
dutifulness he's carrying through,

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building things out in his marking out of
a city by.

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Using his plow he is engaging in this
following through of what is expected of

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him.
Now, a contrast with Odysseus could not be

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greater on this score.
If Aneas is the great maker of boundaries,

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Odysseus is the great crosser of them.
He is constantly trying to find a way to

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skip over whatever boundary or wall is in
his way whereas, Aneas probably would find

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such a thing child's play.
Much more interesting for him is a sense

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of duty of building a wall, of making some
order out of an otherwise utterly chaotic

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world.
It's, it's.

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Tempting, although it might just be a
suggestion.

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But it's tempting to map these two central
cultural values onto political and social

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dynamics of the times and cultures out of
which they emerge.

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The thing about the Greeks, well, they
were in a stage of exploration.

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There was lots of settlement happening
during the time that Homer was writing his

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epic, all the way through into the
Athenian classical period that we focused

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on in the tragedies.
Greeks were sending out colonies all over

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the place.
And this idea of exploration and expansion

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moving into new uncharted territories and
running into strange things there

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would've.
Spoken in a, in a profound way at a

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cultural moment when built on exploration,
and finding new spots.

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Many of them, either uninhabited or only
partially, very partially inhabited.

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And, and then, by contrast a person might
be tempted to map the idea of pietas and

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dutifulness in subordinating your own
individual desires to larger group needs

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to a culture that was now all of a sudden
in control of and worried about

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maintaining a vast empire.
The Romans are at a time, a cultural time,

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when Virgil writes his epic and.
Puts pietas at the very center of what it

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is to be Roman.
A time of preservation.

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The expansion of the Roman empire had
reached its peak, and the idea now was to

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enforce, put up boundaries that could be
enforceable and talk about laws that would

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not be crossed.
It's not a time of fleeing to far flung

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places.
It's instead a time to shore up things

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that have been made and to enforce
boundaries.

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Now, I wouldn't want those to become
stereotypes of what it is to be Greek and

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what it is to become Roman.
But, as I say, there's a temptation, I

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think, to read those cultural values onto
particular social and political climate of

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the time.
Now another, theme that I wanted to make

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sure that we got to, in addition to PA
tosses is the idea of teleology,

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teleology.
Now we've mentioned this in the past in

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the sense of a destiny.
The history that's moving towards some

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predetermined end.
Teleology is another way of talking about

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this.
Telos in Greek is a completion an end

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point, an end or fulfillment telos.
The teleology is the idea that history is

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moving towards some specific end point.
This idea seemed to be entirely absent in

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Homer.
The idea that all of history was moving

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toward some grand end point, not really
there.

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Definitely present in Virgil's Aeneid.
A, a strong.

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Long sense of teleology that presses this
through.

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I wanted to bring up in this, moment
another universal law in the course.

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Remember, these are suggested universal
laws, for discussion.

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Universal law number eight.
People at the top of the power structure

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and people at the bottom of the power
structure tend to embrace the idea that

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history is moving toward some
predetermined end point.

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People at the top of the power structure
and at the bottom of the power structure

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tend to embrace the idea of teleology.
Now, why is that?

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Well, people who have already won, the,
all the games that the society, puts out

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to measure value, in a society, like to
think, well.

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Of course I won.
I, history is bringing me to being on top

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of the, the, the heap, and on top of the
world.

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Everything works for a purpose.
I one time saw a interview with one of our

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great contemporary deities.
The pop singer, Madonna, and she was

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asked, oh great Madonna, is, is there, is
there a point?

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Does everything happen for a purpose or is
everything random?

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Well, guess what, Madonna thinks
everything happens for a purpose.

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All of history is made to bring her, to
the point of grand influence and power and

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wealth that she has.
Those at the top of the power structure

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like to hear this theme.
It endorses their own position in society,

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with giant wheels of machinery of the
universal mechanisms that have brought

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them there.
Those at the bottom of the power structure

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actually embrace this idea, but for quite
a different reason.

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If you are getting ground up by the
machineries that seem to be operating

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around you, you are likely.
To think that it wasn't your fault, and

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that instead there's some, all of these
larger purposes that are acting in the

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historical times, but they just don't
happen to include you.

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So it exonerates you from the sense of
having to feel like whatever position

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you're in is one that you somehow deserve.
It gives a larger meaningful structure in

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the world and you just happen to be on the
outs of it, but it's, it's operating.

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So the, the temptation I think, for folks
on both ends of a power structure is there

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to embrace the ideal of teleology.
Those in the middle.

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Who have aspirational goals of moving up
social and cultural ladders, don't like

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this idea, that history moves toward a
predetermined end.

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It's more interesting to those at either
end of the spectrum of political and

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social influence on power.
Now whatever the worth of that universal

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law.
Let's dig into teleology and Virgil's

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context a little bit more.
Look at all the ways in which destiny

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pulls Aeneas forward.
We've already taken a look when we went

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over the events in books two and three,
especially in three, at the.

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Mums of false starts where Aenaes thinks,
okay here's a place I can build my city.

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You see that in Thrace, Dylos, Crete, the
land of Caeonia, Dydos' Carthage in

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Sicily, all of these places, there's an
aspiration, oh good, here, find one, we

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can get started.
But no, driving on, we're pressed on, some

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divine sign, some message, some prophecy,
comes along and says, no, it's not here,

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it's later.
Put off your impulse to try to build a

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settlement here.
So we've been pulled toward an end point

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that is not something that is just under
the control of Aeneas' troops or Aeneas

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himself let alone Aeneas himself but it is
in the larger building in of the cosmos he

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is going to bring them toward this end
point in Italy almost despite themselves.

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I mean, at a certain point Aeneas has just
had enough.

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He seems to be almost fed up.
Now he keeps pressing on but it's at great

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personal suffering and great personal
cost.

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So these tales center on this.
Forward pulling fate expressed by these

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oracular pronouncements.
Now we also get fate read out to us.

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We get a destiny laid out for us at
specifically important moments of oracular

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pronouncement by figures in the epic.
Jupiter in Book One famously, has his

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speech where he talks about, no.
This is what's going to happen.

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All of these things will unfold for Aeneas
that are going to lead to the founding of

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Rome.
Creusa, the ghost of Creusa, in book two

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shows up when she says, Aeneas you must go
ahead and found Rome.

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Don't worry, I'm dead.
Abandon me.

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And here is what's going to happen?
She lays out for Aeneas all the things

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that he's going to have to do.
It's the beginnings of, or the, the, the

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marker of that this point in history is
only a point leading toward others.

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The teleology here comes through.
The Delian Oracle, we hear on Dylos so

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book three. It's time for you to move
forward and here's the place you're going

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to go.
We hear a little indication of this from

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the harpy Celaeno, you're going to found
your city after you eat your tables.

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It turns out to be the bread platters in
Book seven, which we're not going to read.

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Then from Helenus we have more of a marker
of.

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Teleological statement coming out in a
prophetic way.

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We're going to see also that each of these
currents of fate that's pulling us forward

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through events is pushes through, and
sometimes runs over people that happen to

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be in the way.
The best example of that is something

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we're going to turn to next where we see
Dido.

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Her story is emblematic of a lot of
smaller stories we've seen, of people who

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as the machinaries of fate and destiny are
pressing themselves forward are going to

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get ground up in the gears.
And if Virgil was writing some simple

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propagandistic epic where all of Rome was,
you know, a peachy happy place to be, he

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would not have included all of these
details, that talk about how.

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Awful the suffering is of the people that
have to sacrifice in order to make.

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Rome actually work in order to reach this
predetermined endpoint, and Dido gives us

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a really interesting way to focus on what
that's going to be.