Aeneid Book 12, lines 311 - 340

Aeneas is wounded

by Virgil

A long-delayed duel between Aeneas and Turnus to settle the conflict without further bloodshed is about to begin, and Aeneas and his opposite number, King Latinus, have both sworn to respect the outcome. But Aeneas’s enemy, the Goddess Juno, is at work again. Turnus has a sister, Juturna, who has been granted immortality by Jupiter as thanks for her favours. In disguise, just as the Latin warriors fear that Turnus looks no match for the mighty Aeneas, she goads them into breaking the truce, and yet another bloody general conflict breaks out, in which, to make matters worse, Aeneas is hit by a stray arrow while trying to stop the fighting.

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At pius Aeneas dextram tendebat inermem
nudato capite atque suos clamore vocabat:
‘quo ruitis? quaeve ista repens discordia surgit?
o cohibete iras! ictum iam foedus et omnes
compositae leges. mihi ius concurrere soli;
me sinite atque auferte metus. ego foedera faxo
firma manu; Turnum debent haec iam mihi sacra.’
has inter voces, media inter talia verba
ecce viro stridens alis adlapsa sagitta est,
incertum qua pulsa manu, quo turbine adacta,
quis tantam Rutulis laudem, casusne deusne,
attulerit; pressa est insignis gloria facti,
nec sese Aeneae iactavit vulnere quisquam.
Turnus ut Aenean cedentem ex agmine vidit
turbatosque duces, subita spe fervidus ardet;
poscit equos atque arma simul, saltuque superbus
emicat in currum et manibus molitur habenas.
multa virum volitans dat fortia corpora leto.
seminecis volvit multos: aut agmina curru
proterit aut raptas fugientibus ingerit hastas.
qualis apud gelidi cum flumina concitus Hebri
sanguineus Mavors clipeo increpat atque furentis
bella movens immittit equos, illi aequore aperto
ante Notos Zephyrumque volant, gemit ultima pulsu
Thraca pedum circumque atrae Formidinis ora
Iraeque Insidiaeque, dei comitatus, aguntur:
talis equos alacer media inter proelia Turnus
fumantis sudore quatit, miserabile caesis
hostibus insultans; spargit rapida ungula rores
sanguineos mixtaque cruor calcatur harena.

Pious Aeneas bared his head, held out an unarmed
hand and shouted to his men: “where
are you running? Why this sudden discord?
Control your anger! The pact is struck and all
the rules settled. Only I can fight – leave all
to me, and have no fear. I will enforce the treaty
with a firm hand: by these rites, Turnus is mine!”
Even as these words were uttered, an arrow, flights hissing, struck Aeneas, who knows shot by whom, propelled by what wind, and whether chance or a god had brought the Rutuli such glory; the kudos of the deed
high, but hidden, and none boasted of Aeneas’s wound.
Turnus, seeing Aeneas leave his army, its leaders
perturbed, burned hotly with sudden hope, called for
his horses and armour, and with a bound leapt proud
and splendid onto his chariot and shook the reins.
As he went, he gave many strong men’s bodies to
death, sorely wounded many, crushed the ranks
with his chariot, grabbed spears to use on the fleeing.
As bloody Mars, roused to clash his shield in frenzy
by the rivers of icy Hebrus, looses war and gives their
head to his raging team, that flies over the open sea
before the north and west winds; farthest Thrace groans
with the shock of their hooves, while around the God are
borne the faces of black fear, wrath and ambush,
his retinue; just so swift Turnus whips his horses,
smoking with sweat, into the midst of battle,
riding his sadly slaughtered enemies down;
his horses’ swift hooves scatter the bloody dew
and kicks up gore blended with the sand.

`

More Poems by Virgil

  1. In King Latinus’s hall
  2. Aeneas and Dido meet
  3. Aeneas comes to the Hell of Tartarus
  4. Anchises’s ghost invites Aeneas to visit the underworld
  5. Venus speaks
  6. Sea-nymphs
  7. Dido’s story
  8. Helen in the darkness
  9. Juno throws open the gates of war
  10. A Fury rouses Turnus to war
  11. Dido falls in love
  12. Dido’s release
  13. Laocoon and the snakes
  14. The death of Priam
  15. Into battle
  16. Aeneas arrives in Italy
  17. The Trojan Horse enters the city
  18. How Aeneas will know the site of his city
  19. Aeneas reaches the Elysian Fields
  20. The Trojans reach Carthage
  21. The battle for Priam’s palace
  22. Dido and Aeneas: Hell hath no fury …
  23. The Fury Allecto blows the alarm
  24. Aeneas saves his son and father, but at a cost
  25. The Trojan horse opens
  26. Aeneas’s ships are transformed
  27. More from Virgil’s farming Utopia
  28. Aeneas learns the way to the underworld
  29. Virgil predicts a forthcoming birth and a new golden age
  30. Jupiter’s prophecy
  31. Palinurus the helmsman is lost
  32. The natural history of bees
  33. Aeneas prepares to tell Dido his story
  34. Aeneas’s oath
  35. Juno is reconciled
  36. Aristaeus’s bees
  37. Help for Father Aeneas from Father Tiber
  38. Souls awaiting punishment in Tartarus, and the crimes that brought them there.
  39. The infant Camilla
  40. Charon, the ferryman
  41. Vulcan’s forge
  42. The farmer’s happy lot
  43. King Mezentius meets his match
  44. The Trojans prepare to set sail from Carthage
  45. The journey to Hades begins
  46. Virgil’s perils on the sea
  47. The death of Pallas
  48. New allies for Aeneas
  49. Aeneas tours the site of Rome
  50. Signs of bad weather
  51. Storm at sea!
  52. Rites for the allies’ dead
  53. Aeneas joins the fray
  54. Aeneas sees Marcellus, Augustus’s tragic heir
  55. The portals of sleep
  56. Aeneas prepares for a hopeless fight
  57. The Harpy’s prophecy
  58. Catastrophe for Rome?
  59. Turnus at bay
  60. Rumour
  61. Aeneas finds Dido among the shades
  62. King Latinus grants the Trojans’ request
  63. The death of Priam
  64. The death of Dido
  65. The Syrian hostess
  66. The Aeneid begins
  67. Hector visits Aeneas in a dream
  68. Turnus the wolf
  69. Mourning for Pallas
  70. Laocoon warns against the Trojan horse
  71. Turnus is lured away from battle
  72. Aeneas’s vision of Augustus
  73. Juno’s anger
  74. Omens for Princess Lavinia
  75. Virgil begins the Georgics
  76. Aeneas rescues his Father Anchises
  77. What is this wooden horse?
  78. Virgil’s poetic temple to Caesar
  79. Cassandra is taken
  80. Fire strikes Aeneas’s fleet
  81. The death of Euryalus and Nisus
  82. The boxers
  83. Dido and Aeneas: royal hunt and royal affair
  84. The farmer’s starry calendar
  85. Mercury’s journey to Carthage
  86. Love is the same for all
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