1 00:00:04,820 --> 00:00:09,933 In book four, we get a chance to get close in to the character of Dido. 2 00:00:10,114 --> 00:00:14,945 We learn about her in detail, we see a rich, psychological portrait of her, her 3 00:00:14,945 --> 00:00:20,199 interaction with Aeneas, her interaction with her sister Ana, the, complexity of 4 00:00:20,199 --> 00:00:23,158 Dido's character makes her quite a strong figure. 5 00:00:23,158 --> 00:00:28,050 In fact, I think she's probably the most complex character of these opening books 6 00:00:28,231 --> 00:00:31,070 more so than even Aeneas. She is sympathetic. 7 00:00:31,070 --> 00:00:36,142 We get to know a lot about her we've seen her already being a pretty good person. 8 00:00:36,324 --> 00:00:41,094 She welcomes in Aeneas and his men, she shows them hospitality, and the way that 9 00:00:41,094 --> 00:00:44,520 we know from. In the ancient Mediterranean, it's a good 10 00:00:44,520 --> 00:00:47,998 thing to do. She's building a city, something Aeneas 11 00:00:47,998 --> 00:00:51,411 can admire she seems to be doing everything right. 12 00:00:51,604 --> 00:00:56,692 In Book one, we show through no fault of her own, the Goddess Venus sneaks up on 13 00:00:56,692 --> 00:01:02,295 her and gets her to fall in love with, with Aeneas, through the intervention of 14 00:01:02,295 --> 00:01:05,837 Amour, her son. So, she's sort of portrayed in that, in 15 00:01:05,837 --> 00:01:11,568 that sense as, as not fully in control, but we can understand how she is overcome 16 00:01:11,568 --> 00:01:17,050 by divine intervention. But she is a, a, a someone who's. 17 00:01:17,240 --> 00:01:20,792 Tale is not gonna lead to happiness and friendliness. 18 00:01:20,792 --> 00:01:25,359 In fact, quite the opposite. This sympathetic character, Virgil spent a 19 00:01:25,359 --> 00:01:30,307 lot of time watching get ground up by the machinery that's leading toward the 20 00:01:30,497 --> 00:01:34,303 founding of Rome. We were talking last time about how all 21 00:01:34,303 --> 00:01:39,885 these teleological currents are married, wedded to ideas that are pushing backward 22 00:01:39,885 --> 00:01:43,564 along the way. It's not a simple movement to the future 23 00:01:43,755 --> 00:01:49,464 there's great suffering to be paid on the way and Dido gives us a, a way of focusing 24 00:01:49,464 --> 00:01:55,821 in on one specific scene of this book four is the richest portrayal of what, she goes 25 00:01:55,821 --> 00:01:59,310 through. Starts off as we see a hunt, happen. 26 00:01:59,524 --> 00:02:05,861 Aeneas and Dido and their, their, parties, head out for a hunt into the wilderness. 27 00:02:05,861 --> 00:02:09,280 And low and behold, wouldn't you know it. A storm. 28 00:02:09,471 --> 00:02:13,935 Breaks and Aeneas and Dido find themselves taking shelter in the cave. 29 00:02:14,126 --> 00:02:19,610 The two of them, they're have an interlude that an Virgil describes in really 30 00:02:19,610 --> 00:02:23,756 interesting language. So let's have a look at what the passage 31 00:02:23,756 --> 00:02:28,220 is, Now to the self same cave came Dido and the captain of the Trojans. 32 00:02:28,220 --> 00:02:32,184 Primal Earth herself and Nuptial Juno opened the ritual. 33 00:02:32,184 --> 00:02:36,573 Torches of lightning blazed. High heaven became witness to the 34 00:02:36,573 --> 00:02:39,970 marriage. And nymphs cried out wild hymns from a 35 00:02:39,970 --> 00:02:43,793 mountaintop. That day was the first cause of death and 36 00:02:43,793 --> 00:02:47,262 first of sorrow. Dido had no further qualms as to 37 00:02:47,262 --> 00:02:52,642 impressions given and set abroad and thought no longer of a secret love but 38 00:02:52,642 --> 00:02:56,680 called it marriage. Thus, after that name, she hid her fault. 39 00:02:56,680 --> 00:02:59,625 Now, what's Virgil given us in this, passage? 40 00:02:59,625 --> 00:03:03,980 Notice what, what we have. We have, to the self-same cave came Dido 41 00:03:03,980 --> 00:03:09,103 and the captain of the Trojans, primal earth herself and nuptial Juno opened the 42 00:03:09,103 --> 00:03:12,497 ritual. To invoke earth and Juno here is to invoke 43 00:03:12,497 --> 00:03:16,186 the two goddesses that have. A great deal to do with marriage 44 00:03:16,186 --> 00:03:18,977 ceremonies. So we're talking about a specific kind of 45 00:03:18,977 --> 00:03:23,138 marriage that's being, the episode here is being cast as an actual bona fide 46 00:03:23,138 --> 00:03:26,245 marriage, with the two of them, keeping an eye out for it. 47 00:03:26,403 --> 00:03:30,054 Virgil calls it a ritual. We've got torches of lightning blazing. 48 00:03:30,054 --> 00:03:35,262 Marriage ceremonies are marked by torches. To talk about oh, torches is, is already 49 00:03:35,262 --> 00:03:38,614 to invoke a very strongly ritual context of marriage. 50 00:03:38,614 --> 00:03:43,522 And we've got lightening flashing around the cave that's taking the role of these 51 00:03:43,522 --> 00:03:46,036 torches. High heaven became witness to the 52 00:03:46,036 --> 00:03:48,850 marriage. There's Virgil telling us that what's 53 00:03:48,850 --> 00:03:51,484 happening in the cave is an actual marriage. 54 00:03:51,484 --> 00:03:54,536 The nymphs cry out wild hymns from the mountaintop. 55 00:03:54,536 --> 00:03:59,864 Well, that's also supposed to go on during a marriage, with nymphs moving around and 56 00:03:59,864 --> 00:04:03,280 wild songs that get sung. Then Virgil takes a turn. 57 00:04:03,280 --> 00:04:06,400 Look what happens in his description of the event. 58 00:04:06,400 --> 00:04:11,269 That day was the first cause of death, and first of sorrow, Dido had no further 59 00:04:11,269 --> 00:04:14,140 qualms as to impressions given and set abroad. 60 00:04:14,140 --> 00:04:18,668 She's thought no longer of a secret love, but called it marriage, thus under that 61 00:04:18,668 --> 00:04:22,404 name she hid her fault. The first half of the passage seems pretty 62 00:04:22,404 --> 00:04:25,520 clearly that. Virgil is telling us, yeah, there was a 63 00:04:25,520 --> 00:04:30,342 marriage that happened in that cave. The second half of the passage is Virgil 64 00:04:30,342 --> 00:04:34,476 telling us, no, it wasn't a marriage. Now, which Virgil do we believe? 65 00:04:34,476 --> 00:04:39,424 It's actually quite hard to decide. Did what happened in the cave count as a 66 00:04:39,424 --> 00:04:43,056 marriage, or did it not? Now, Roman legal precedents on such, 67 00:04:43,244 --> 00:04:47,691 matters are not totally clear. It's not absolutely transparent what was 68 00:04:47,691 --> 00:04:52,326 supposed to have happened there. In fact, it's quite murky what happened 69 00:04:52,326 --> 00:04:55,019 there. Does Aeneas owe some affiliation and 70 00:04:55,019 --> 00:04:58,000 allegiance now to Dido? Well, it's. 71 00:04:58,000 --> 00:05:01,876 Tough to say. Dido surely thinks he does and he in the 72 00:05:01,876 --> 00:05:06,830 end thinks that he doesn't. Aeneas comes right, or Mercury comes right 73 00:05:06,830 --> 00:05:10,491 along and says to Aeneas, you've got to go, run away. 74 00:05:10,491 --> 00:05:15,804 Time for you to get out of here. Aeneas is ready to sneak away, shows up on 75 00:05:15,804 --> 00:05:21,906 pages 105 and 106 and when he's caught he seems almost a little bit guilty on 490 to 76 00:05:21,906 --> 00:05:27,219 500 in the Fitzgerald translation. He's, when he's caught he quickly blames 77 00:05:27,219 --> 00:05:30,522 fate: I don't want to leave but I had to leave. 78 00:05:30,522 --> 00:05:33,478 It's this. Destiny that's pulling me forward. 79 00:05:33,660 --> 00:05:40,492 There's nothing I can do to escape it. Dido will have none of this she is 80 00:05:40,492 --> 00:05:46,432 absolutely over the top, angry with Aeneas and his, the murkiness around the 81 00:05:46,432 --> 00:05:52,265 presentation of the episode such as Virgil includes, makes the clarity of her anger I 82 00:05:52,265 --> 00:05:57,824 think in the story even more fathomable. We see the one person here that seems to 83 00:05:57,824 --> 00:06:00,226 know what happened. It's not Aeneas. 84 00:06:00,226 --> 00:06:05,374 It doesn't really seem to be Virgil. The one person that seems to know what 85 00:06:05,374 --> 00:06:09,491 happened is Dido. And the strength of her reaction is really 86 00:06:09,491 --> 00:06:11,290 something to be. Taken away. 87 00:06:11,481 --> 00:06:16,957 We see this, a wonderful mural behind me from, a frieze from, a mural from Pompeii 88 00:06:17,148 --> 00:06:20,331 that depicts, depicts stages in the lives of women. 89 00:06:20,331 --> 00:06:24,661 A wonderfully rich, setting for us to have our conversation. 90 00:06:24,852 --> 00:06:29,945 Dido and Aeneas having their marriage, it's not exactly clear what's supposed to 91 00:06:29,945 --> 00:06:34,275 have happened there. When Aeneas is caught he gives this, quick 92 00:06:34,275 --> 00:06:38,413 saying, so please no more of these appeals that set us both afire. 93 00:06:38,413 --> 00:06:43,380 I sail for Italy not of my own free will. Aeneas is going to have to move forward 94 00:06:43,380 --> 00:06:48,970 because destiny is pulling him there. The speaking of a, 95 00:06:49,343 --> 00:06:53,894 The, the, the, as the story unfolds between Anna and Dido and the nastiness 96 00:06:53,894 --> 00:06:59,939 that they start to feel towards Aeneas page 113 we have a suggestion of a magical 97 00:06:59,939 --> 00:07:03,617 rite of burning Aeneas' stuff, things that come from Aeneas. 98 00:07:03,804 --> 00:07:08,292 Love magic is a very common thing in antiquity, and this would have been 99 00:07:08,292 --> 00:07:12,904 understood through that lens. Magic was not something you would've been 100 00:07:12,904 --> 00:07:18,015 proud of doing, it was something you would have done if you felt in desperate need 101 00:07:18,015 --> 00:07:22,907 for it and that, that, that. Dido was reaching to this direction, seems 102 00:07:22,907 --> 00:07:26,449 understandable. Page 114 we start to call on underworld 103 00:07:26,449 --> 00:07:29,475 divinities Iarbas, Chaos, the Chasm, Hecate, Diana. 104 00:07:29,669 --> 00:07:34,241 These are gods and goddess that you reach out to when really need help. 105 00:07:34,241 --> 00:07:39,456 Remember these are iconic divinities from older order of things, that are also 106 00:07:39,456 --> 00:07:42,805 associated with magic, that Dido was appealing to. 107 00:07:42,805 --> 00:07:46,991 Then again, quite, its quite an understandable state that you find 108 00:07:46,991 --> 00:07:50,081 yourself in, in, in great, in great distress. 109 00:07:50,081 --> 00:07:55,032 Now, when I read this scene of Dido I always have a different feelings toward it 110 00:07:55,032 --> 00:07:58,152 from year to year. It's as though when I'm reading Homer I 111 00:07:58,152 --> 00:08:01,487 can feel like, okay. I put one extra brick in the edifice of my 112 00:08:01,487 --> 00:08:05,953 knowledge of Homer each time I read it I learn a little something here and I learn 113 00:08:05,953 --> 00:08:10,310 a little something there and I kind of build a wall up of knowledge as time goes 114 00:08:10,310 --> 00:08:12,570 by. When I read Virgil I feel like, reading 115 00:08:12,570 --> 00:08:16,066 these important scenes, every time I read it the whole wall moves. 116 00:08:16,066 --> 00:08:20,263 And I think this case of Dido is one of those especially rich ones where it's 117 00:08:20,263 --> 00:08:24,782 really hard to make a final statement on how we're supposed to read this episode of 118 00:08:24,782 --> 00:08:27,310 Dido. Let me just give you a couple of examples 119 00:08:27,310 --> 00:08:31,979 of different strong feelings I've had strong interpretations I've had of this of 120 00:08:31,979 --> 00:08:34,556 this scene. And, none of these do I think is the 121 00:08:34,556 --> 00:08:37,958 absolute be all and end all. Let just present several different 122 00:08:37,958 --> 00:08:40,123 readings. First of all, the sympathetic one, 123 00:08:40,123 --> 00:08:44,247 The one I've been presenting pretty much so far were really brought through her 124 00:08:44,247 --> 00:08:47,186 version of events here. We see, feel sorry for her, I think. 125 00:08:47,340 --> 00:08:51,619 This makes her tale and instance of these back currents that Virgil spends time on. 126 00:08:51,773 --> 00:08:55,743 So rather than just focusing on the destiny that's leading us forward, we see 127 00:08:55,743 --> 00:08:59,300 all the suffering that has to be made to make it things happen. 128 00:08:59,300 --> 00:09:02,451 In a good way. It makes us, I think, quite sympathetic 129 00:09:02,451 --> 00:09:07,328 with Dido and feel her pain in a way, and watch, a, be, the awfulness that comes her 130 00:09:07,328 --> 00:09:11,817 direction, get paid out in, things that she doesn't quite seem to deserve. 131 00:09:11,817 --> 00:09:16,478 But, then part of me wants to jump in and say, wait a minute there are a couple of 132 00:09:16,478 --> 00:09:20,909 other possible readings we can do here, how about for example a functionalist 133 00:09:20,909 --> 00:09:24,095 reading. What if we examined here, what kind of 134 00:09:24,095 --> 00:09:29,386 social values are being underwritten, Are being legitimized by the telling of 135 00:09:29,386 --> 00:09:32,572 the tale? Well, we've got a pretty clear example 136 00:09:32,572 --> 00:09:38,167 here of the overriding virtue of Pietas being made to be shown triumphant in this 137 00:09:38,167 --> 00:09:41,647 situation. Even if Aeneas would have wanted to stay 138 00:09:41,647 --> 00:09:45,945 with Dido he couldn't. Pietas' duty requires that he go forward 139 00:09:45,945 --> 00:09:51,540 and even though it's at great cost this Pietas is the central anchoring virtue of 140 00:09:51,540 --> 00:09:54,815 this culture and therefore it must be fulfilled. 141 00:09:54,815 --> 00:09:55,838 So, Functionalism, 142 00:09:55,838 --> 00:09:59,757 A functionalist reading here would underscore that the value being 143 00:09:59,757 --> 00:10:03,499 legitimized is Pietas. Irrespective of the cost, we still have to 144 00:10:03,499 --> 00:10:06,073 do it. Furthermore, and in support of this 145 00:10:06,073 --> 00:10:10,810 reading, remember at the very beginning, Dido shows herself as someone who is very 146 00:10:10,810 --> 00:10:14,026 clearly exhibiting a traditional virtue of Xenia. 147 00:10:14,026 --> 00:10:18,880 She's welcoming, she's welcoming, Aeneas and his crew, giving them a home. 148 00:10:18,880 --> 00:10:21,570 Offering to marry him. You can marry our queen. 149 00:10:21,570 --> 00:10:23,734 Well, marry me. You can have a kingdom. 150 00:10:23,734 --> 00:10:27,770 All these things are being exhibited through Dido's reactions toward, 151 00:10:27,770 --> 00:10:31,033 Toward, toward Aeneas. Well what Aeneas does in the end is say, 152 00:10:31,033 --> 00:10:36,128 Xenia is all well and good and that might have made sense in the home maritime, but 153 00:10:36,128 --> 00:10:40,079 it's Pietas now that's the central virtue, and we have to anchor that. 154 00:10:40,079 --> 00:10:43,400 So in this functionalist duel Pietas wins out over Xenia. 155 00:10:43,400 --> 00:10:48,205 I think a really interesting way of looking at how this thing might be working 156 00:10:48,205 --> 00:10:51,124 here. Another way of thinking about this puts it 157 00:10:51,124 --> 00:10:55,321 in a richer historical context understanding what's happening during 158 00:10:55,321 --> 00:10:58,423 Virgil's own time. Aeneas here shows a master Roman 159 00:10:58,423 --> 00:11:03,106 dominating a loved one, Carthage, who wishes to be with Rome but is eventually 160 00:11:03,106 --> 00:11:06,451 destroyed by Rome. This would map onto a history of the 161 00:11:06,451 --> 00:11:09,857 Carthaginian Wars that the Romans would have known well. 162 00:11:09,857 --> 00:11:14,115 Carthage was, of all the cities in the Mediterranean, the one that most 163 00:11:14,115 --> 00:11:17,400 powerfully stood between them and total domination of. 164 00:11:17,400 --> 00:11:20,463 Mediterranean. The Carthaginians, in real historical 165 00:11:20,463 --> 00:11:25,450 periods that the Romans knew well, for over a hundred years did awful battle and 166 00:11:25,450 --> 00:11:28,694 war with the Romans. In fact, the Romans remembered the 167 00:11:28,694 --> 00:11:33,760 Carthaginian conflict, and their ultimate victory there, as the great ex, exhibition 168 00:11:33,760 --> 00:11:38,730 of Roman power and Roman strength. It showed pietas, duty, fulfillment of 169 00:11:38,730 --> 00:11:41,638 your duty to the, the greatest degree possible. 170 00:11:41,638 --> 00:11:46,224 It was the great exhibition of Roman-ness as they conquered the Carthaginians no 171 00:11:46,224 --> 00:11:50,584 matter how awful the suffering was. They eh, won out over the Carthaginians. 172 00:11:50,584 --> 00:11:55,566 Now with that historical background of the Carthaginian and Punic Wars let's go back 173 00:11:55,566 --> 00:11:59,983 and have a look at what's happening here. Now we have Carthage who's feminized. 174 00:11:59,983 --> 00:12:03,267 We've got hyper-masculine Rome, who wins out over Carthage. 175 00:12:03,267 --> 00:12:07,513 Carthage wants nothing more than just to be loved by Rome, but instead Rome 176 00:12:07,513 --> 00:12:10,363 destroys her. So, as a contemporary Romanite, it's kind 177 00:12:10,363 --> 00:12:14,116 of, wow-wow element to this. As you see the carthogen once again gets 178 00:12:14,116 --> 00:12:16,652 crushed. Looking at another historical component 179 00:12:16,652 --> 00:12:20,933 here, let's walk this back, just a little bit, and, tie it in, on something, that, a 180 00:12:20,933 --> 00:12:24,580 piece of contemporary history, that Virgil would have known very well. 181 00:12:24,580 --> 00:12:30,622 Our hero, Aeneas, shuns the clutches of a North African sex goddess, thereby besting 182 00:12:30,622 --> 00:12:35,265 Odysseus, right? He does not fall for the wiles of that we 183 00:12:35,265 --> 00:12:41,970 see Odysseus falling for with these various kinds of exciting women on strange 184 00:12:41,970 --> 00:12:44,107 far away places. He gets away. 185 00:12:44,107 --> 00:12:50,224 He also escapes faults that would have been on the front of the minds of Romans 186 00:12:50,224 --> 00:12:51,824 during. Virgil's time. 187 00:12:52,057 --> 00:12:58,100 What happened in Egypt when a great general named Anthony fell in love with a 188 00:12:58,100 --> 00:13:01,755 North African sex goddess, Cleopatra. Oh my goodness, 189 00:13:01,755 --> 00:13:04,870 Awful things happened and it ripped all of Rome apart. 190 00:13:04,870 --> 00:13:09,037 So if we're trying to imagine, a sympathetic reading of Dido, we have to 191 00:13:09,037 --> 00:13:14,074 run that past what is clearly, obviously going to be a very un-sympathetic reading 192 00:13:14,074 --> 00:13:18,621 of a figure like Cleopatra, coursing around in the contemporary historical 193 00:13:18,621 --> 00:13:21,692 accounts. So, of course Aeneas leaves behind Dino. 194 00:13:21,692 --> 00:13:26,177 He can't fall victim, no matter how sincere his love is, or her love is, he 195 00:13:26,177 --> 00:13:30,293 can't fall victim to that. If he did, he would be no better, than the 196 00:13:30,293 --> 00:13:35,270 people that had caused such awful civil war in recent history in Roman memory. 197 00:13:35,270 --> 00:13:39,571 So all of these things I think are layers that are built into this story. 198 00:13:39,571 --> 00:13:43,048 As I say, I'm not sure which one I would endorse in the end. 199 00:13:43,048 --> 00:13:47,703 Virgil, I don't think, does that for us. He's not trying to tale, tell some simple 200 00:13:47,703 --> 00:13:52,122 tale that has tidy lessons to be drawn. Instead he's always presenting very 201 00:13:52,122 --> 00:13:55,422 complex tales. Now I don't want that to be an invitation 202 00:13:55,422 --> 00:13:59,665 for all of us to say, oh yeah. Whatever interpretation of Virgil you want 203 00:13:59,665 --> 00:14:01,432 to give is okay. Que sera, sera. 204 00:14:01,432 --> 00:14:04,261 I'm okay, you're okay. Your interpretation's fine. 205 00:14:04,261 --> 00:14:06,382 Yours is fine too. Let's not do that. 206 00:14:06,382 --> 00:14:09,270 Instead let's say in order to understand all the. 207 00:14:09,270 --> 00:14:12,139 Complexities, The different shades of grey in Virgil's 208 00:14:12,139 --> 00:14:14,583 text, We have to double our efforts to read it 209 00:14:14,583 --> 00:14:19,047 very closely and work very hard and have intense conversations back and forth about 210 00:14:19,047 --> 00:14:22,341 what's happening. I'm really interested to see what you all 211 00:14:22,341 --> 00:14:25,901 are going to make of this story, in further discussion that we have. 212 00:14:26,061 --> 00:14:29,461 I think there's a tremendous amount, still to be talked about. 213 00:14:29,461 --> 00:14:31,800 I've only just barely scratched the surface.