Aeneid 11 translation

Lines 1 – 11
Meanwhile rising Dawn left the ocean waves: Aeneas, although his concerns drive him to give time
to his comrades’ burials, and his mind is disturbed by death, as victor, at first light, he began to
perform his vows to the gods. He sets upright a huge oak trunk, with its branches lopped all round,
on a mound, and on it puts the gleaming armour stripped from the leader, Mezentius: as a trophy to
you, great god of war, he fastens the crests to it, dripping with blood, the man’s broken weapons,
and the breastplate, attacked and stabbed in twelve places: he fastens the bronze shield to its left
side, and hangs the ivory sword from its neck.

Lines 12 – 28
Then beginning (for the whole crowd of leaders was thronged around and encircling him) he
encourages his exhalting comrades: ‘Very great things have been achieved, men: let all fear of
what’s left to do depart: these are the spoils and the first fruits of war from a proud king, and this is
Mezentius, achieved by my hands. Now our path is towards King [Latinus] and his Latin walls. With
your weapons prepared, anticipate with courage and hope so that no delay may hinder us
unprepared, as soon as the gods above grant their support to pluck out our standards, and lead out
our young men from the camp, or sluggish morale slow us through fear. Meanwhile let us consign to
earth our allies and the unburied bodies of our friends, the only tribute recognised in the
Underworld’s depths. Go,’ he says, ‘adorn these noble spirits with your last gifts, who have won this
country for us with their blood, and first let Pallas be sent to Evander’s grieving city, he, whom not
short of courage, a black day took away and drowned with bitter death.’

Lines 29 – 41
So he speaks, weeping, and retraces his steps to the threshold. Where old man Acoetes was keeping
watch on the laid aside corpse of lifeless Pallas, who before had been armour-bearer to Arcadian
Evander, but then, having been assigned to his dear ward, he was not going as a companion with
such favourable auspices. Both the whole band of servants and the Trojan crowd stood around, and
the Trojan women, their hair let down in mourning. But when Aeneas brought himself into the tall
doors they raise a huge groan to the stars, having beaten their breasts, and raised a great cry to the
heavens, and the palace resounds with sad grief. When he sees the face and head of snow-white
Pallas propped up, and the open wound on his smooth chest caused by the Italian spear, he speaks
thus, with tears welling up:
Lines 42 – 58
‘Poor boy, when favourable Fortune entered was it she who begrudged you to me, so that you
would not see my kingdom, or ride, as victor, to your father’s house? This was not the promise I had
given your father, Evander, on leaving, when having embraced me as I left, he sent me into a great
command and, fearful, warned me that the enemy were fierce, a battle with a tough people. And
now indeed he, much gripped by vain hope, perhaps is making vows, heaps up the altars with gifts,
while we, grieving, accompany the lifeless young man with empty honour, one who owes nothing to
the gods. Unfortunate one, you will see the bitter funeral of your son! Are these are return and
awaited triumphs? Is this my strong pledge? Yet, Evander, you will not look upon a son forced to flee
with shameful wounds, nor as a father will you pray for a terrible death with a surviving son. Alas,
how great a protection you lose, Italy, and how big your loss is, Iulus.’

Lines 59 – 75
When he lamented these things, he orders the poor corpse to be lifted and he sends a thousand
men, chosen from the whole army, to attend the last rites, and share the father’s tears, a small
consolation for so great a grief, but owed to a sad father. Others, not slow, weave a soft bier of
wickerwork with shoots of arbutus, and twigs of oak, and they shade the couches constructed with a
covering of leaves. Here they place the youth high on his rustic bed: like a flower picked by the
thumb of a young girl, whether a sweet violet or a drooping hyacinth, whose brightness and beauty
have not yet faded, but mother earth no longer nourishes it, or supplies with strength. Then Aeneas
carried a pair of robes rigid with gold and purple which Sidonian Dido, delighting in the labour, had
made for him once with her own hands and had interwoven the fabric with fine gold.

Lines 76 – 88
Sorrowing, he puts one of these on the youth as a last honour, and veils his hair, which is about to be
be burned, with a cloth, and besides heaps up many gifts from the Laurentine battle and orders the
spoils to be led in a long line: he adds horses and weapons which had been stripped from the enemy.
He had bound the hands of those he would send as offerings to the shades, behind their backs, to
sprinkle the flames with slain blood, and orders the leaders themselves to carry tree-trunks clothed
with enemy weapons, and the names of the enemy to be affixed. Unfortunate Acoetes, worn out
with age, is led along, now marring his chest with his fists, now his face with his nails, and he is
spread out having been flung with his whole body on the ground: and they lead chariots soaked with
Rutulian blood.
Lines 88 – 99
Behind goes the war-horse, Aethon, with his trappings set aside, weeping, and he wets his face with
great tear drops. Others carry [Pallas’s] spear and helmet, the rest Turnus held as victor. Then a
grieving phalanx follows, Trojans, all the Etruscans, and Arcadians with weapons reversed.
After the whole line of his comrades had advanced far ahead, Aeneas halted, and added this, with a
deep groan: ‘The same dreadful fates of war calls me from here to other weeping: hail forever, I
pray, noble Pallas, and forever, farewell.’ Having spoken no more he tbegan to direct his way
towards the high walls and carry his steps into the camp.

Lines 100 – 107

And now ambassadors came from the Latin city, shaded with olive branches, asking for pardon: to
return the bodies of men, lying on the plain, laid low by the sword, and allow them to go under a
mound of earth: and that there would be no quarrel with the conquered and with those deprived of
the upper world, and for him to spare those who were once hosts and called father in laws. Whom,
requesting things which he could not refuse, Good Aeneas sends them away with their plea granted
and added these words as well:

Lines 108 – 121

‘Latins, what unworthy fortune has entangled you in a war like this, so that you fly from being our
friends? Do you beg me for peace for your dead and those killed by fate in battle? I would have
wished to grant it to the living too. I would not have come, if the fates had not given me a place for a
home, nor do I wage war with your people: your king abandoned our friendship, and entrusted
himself in preference to the arms of Turnus. It would have been more just for Turnus himself to
expose himself to this death. If he plans to end the war with his hand and drive out the Trojans, it
would have been fitting to clash with me with these weapons: he whom the gods or his right hand
granted life, would have lived. Now go and place fires beneath your unfortunate countrymen.’
Aeneas had spoken. They were silent and astounded, and turning their eyes and faces towards each
other kept them fixed there.

Lines 122 – 138

Then Drances, an elder, always with his dislike and reproaches, hostile to young Turnus in turn
returns these words thus: ‘O, Trojan hero, great in fame, greater in battle, with what praises am I to
make you equal to the heaven? Am I to wonder first at your justice or your efforts in war? Indeed we
will gratefully carry these words back to our native city, and if any Fortune offers a way, we will ally
you to king Latinus. Let Turnus seek treaties for himself. And furthermore it will be a delight to raise
the mass of walls decreed by fate and support the Trojan stones on our shoulders.’ He had spoken,
and they all began to roar with one voice.
They arranged a twelve-day truce, and with peace as mediator, Trojans and Latins wandered
together, without fear of punishment, through the wooded ridges. The tall ash rings to the two-
edged axe, they overturn pine-trees rearing up to the stars, and they do not cease to split the oaks,
and fragrant cedar, with wedges, or carry the mountain ash in groaning wagons.

Lines 139 – 151

And now Rumour flying, heralding news of such great grief, fills [the ears of] Evander and Evander’s
palace and the city: who recently was carrying Pallas’s victory to Latium. The Arcadians ran to the
gates, and following ancient custom, seized funerary torches; the road shines with the long
procession of flames and picks out the fields far and wide. The Trojan crowd, coming to meet them,
joins the companies of mourners. As soon as the women saw them coming beneath the houses, they
set the sad city ablaze with their cries. But no force could hold back Evander, and he came into their
midst. He collapsed on top of Pallas, once the bier was set down, and clings to it both crying and
groaning, till at last, he spoke, a path for his voice scarcely clear of grief:

Lines 152 – 181

‘O Pallas, you did not give these promises to your parent [when he begged] that you would entrust
yourself more cautiously to savage war. I was not ignorant how intoxicating new glory in weapons
could be and how sweet, sweet honour won in a first conflict has power. O the beginnings of your
wretched young life, your harsh schooling in a war so near, and my vows and prayers heard by none
of the gods! Happy were you, O my most sacred wife, in a death that saved you from this sorrow! In
contrast I, by living, have outdone my allotted years, to remain surviving as a father. Would that the
Rutulians had overwhelmed me with their spears, having followed the confederate arms of the
Trojans. I should have given my life, and this pomp should have carried me, not Pallas, home! Yet I
would not blame you, Trojans, or our treaty, or the hands we clasped in friendship: such a fate as
this was owed to me in old age. But if an untimely death awaited my son it will please me that he fell
first with thousands of Volscians cut down, leading the Trojans into Latium. Indeed, Pallas, I thought
you worthy of no other funeral than the funeral of which the good Aeneas, the great Phyrgians, the
Etruscan leaders and all the Etruscan army thought you worthy. Those, whom your right-hand dealt
death to, bring great trophies: Turnus, you too would be standing here, a huge tree-trunk, decked in
arms, if age and strength from years had been alike in both. But why in my unhappiness do I keep
the Trojans from war? Go, and remember to take this message to your king: as to why I prolong my
hateful life, now Pallas is dead, your right hand is the cause which you see owes father and son [the
death of] Turnus. This is the only place left open to you for [the exercise of your own] worth and
fortune. I don’t ask for joy while alive, (that’s not allowed me) but to convey it to my son down in the
lowest shades.’

Lines 182 – 202

Dawn, meanwhile, had raised her kindly light for wretched men, bringing back work and toil: now
father Aeneas, now Tarchon, set up pyres on the curving bay. Here according to ancestral custom
they each brought the bodies of their people, and as the dark fires were thrust beneath, the high sky
is hidden in murky darkness. Three times they ran around the blazing pyres, girded in gleaming
armour, three times they circled the sad funeral flames on horseback, and uttered wailing cries.
brought the bodies of their people, and as the gloomy fires were lit beneath, the high sky was veiled
in a dark mist. Three times they circled the blazing pyres, clad in gleaming armour, three times they
rounded the mournful funeral flames on horseback, and uttered wailing cries. The earth is sprinkled
with tears, as are their weapons. The noise of both men and the noise of the trumpets goes to the
heavens. Here some launch spoils, torn from the slaughtered Latins onto the fire, helmets and
beautiful swords, reins and seething wheels; others, familiar gifts, their shields and unfortunate
weapons. All around many bodies of oxen are sacrificed to Death, they slaughter over the flames
pigs covered in bristles and flocks seized from the whole country. Then they watch their comrades
burn, all along the shore, and stand by the half-burned pyres, and are able not tear themselves away
until dewy night revolves the sky round, studded with shining stars.

Lines 203 – 224

Nonetheless the wretched Latins built innumerable pyres in another part. Half of the many corpses
they bury in the earth, half, having been carried away, they lift into the neighbouring fields and send
them back to the city. The rest, a huge heap of confused slaughter, they burnt without count, and
without honour. Then the desolate fields on every side gleam in rivalry with thick fires. The third day
had flung back the icy shadow from the sky: grieving, they levelled the bones, mixed with deep ash,
from the pyres, and loaded them with a warm mound of earth. Meanwhile, an exceptional clamour
and the greatest part of their long grief [rose] in the town, in the city of super-rich Latinus. Here
mothers and unhappy daughters-in-law, here the loving hearts of grieving sisters, and boys bereaved
of their fathers, curse the dreadful war, and the marriage of Turnus, and they order him to fight it
out with armour and blade, he who asks for himself the kingdom of Italy and the foremost honours.
Cruel Drances adds to this and insists that Turnus alone is summoned, that he alone is challenged to
the contest. At the same time the views of many are against it, and for Turnus, the Queen’s noble
name protects him, his great fame, through the victories he has won, supports the hero.