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