Aeneid Book 4, lines 362 - 393

Dido and Aeneas: Hell hath no fury …

by Virgil

Mercury, the messenger of the Gods, has been sent to tell Aeneas in the starkest terms that he must leave Carthage and Dido and fulfil his mission for the foundation of Rome. Concerned about how Dido will react, he begins to prepare his fleet without telling her, but she finds out. Confronted, he has just told her about Mercury’s message and assured her, not too convincingly, that he did not intend to deceive her about leaving. Not very tactfully, he has added that he never proposed marriage and, unlike her, did not regard their affair as one. Here is Dido’s reply.

See the illustrated blog post here.

To follow the story of Aeneas in sequence, use this link to the full Pantheon Poets selection of extracts from the Aeneid. See the next episode here.

To listen, press play:

To scroll the original and English translation of the poem at the same time - tap inside one box to select it and then scroll.

Talia dicentem iamdudum aversa tuetur
huc illuc volvens oculos totumque pererrat
luminibus tacitis et sic accensa profatur:
‘nec tibi diva parens generis nec Dardanus auctor,
perfide, sed duris genuit te cautibus horrens
Caucasus Hyrcanaeque admorunt ubera tigres.
nam quid dissimulo aut quae me ad maiora reservo?
num fletu ingemuit nostro? num lumina flexit?
num lacrimas victus dedit aut miseratus amantem est?
quae quibus anteferam? iam iam nec maxima Iuno
nec Saturnius haec oculis pater aspicit aequis.
nusquam tuta fides. eiectum litore, egentem
excepi et regni demens in parte locavi.
amissam classem, socios a morte reduxi
(heu furiis incensa feror!): nunc augur Apollo,
nunc Lyciae sortes, nunc et Iove missus ab ipso
interpres divum fert horrida iussa per auras.
scilicet is superis labor est, ea cura quietos
sollicitat. neque te teneo neque dicta refello:
i, sequere Italiam ventis, pete regna per undas.
spero equidem mediis, si quid pia numina possunt,
supplicia hausurum scopulis et nomine Dido
saepe vocaturum. sequar atris ignibus absens
et, cum frigida mors anima seduxerit artus,
omnibus umbra locis adero. dabis, improbe, poenas.
audiam et haec Manis veniet mihi fama sub imos.’
his medium dictis sermonem abrumpit et auras
aegra fugit seque ex oculis avertit et aufert,
linquens multa metu cunctantem et multa parantem
dicere. suscipiunt famulae conlapsaque membra
marmoreo referunt thalamo stratisque reponunt.

She watches him sidelong as he speaks, her eyes darting
to and fro, looks him up and down in silence,
and, livid, bursts out: “you traitor, no goddess was
your mother, nor was it Dardanus who founded your line:
bleak Caucasus bore you among its jagged rocks
and Hyrcanaean tigers suckled you. Why should I pretend?
What worse outrages should I wait for? Didn’t he sigh
in sympathy when I wept? Didn’t he turn his gaze to me?
Wasn’t he overcome by tears? Didn’t he pity me, see how
I loved him? Where to begin? Neither great Juno, nor
Father Jupiter can see this happen unmoved. Loyalty
can’t be trusted anywhere. I rescued him, washed up,
bereft, and in my madness set him to share my kingdom.
I brought his lost ships, his comrades back from death!
I am ablaze, driven by furies! Now Apollo the prophet,
Lycian oracles and Mercury, divine messenger of Jove,
bring these dreadful biddings through the air. So that’s
Gods’ will, what spoils their calm! I’ll not detain you,
question their word! Follow Italy on the winds, seek
your realm across the sea! I hope you will
know torture amidst the rocks, if just gods have power,
call again and again on Dido’s name!
From far, I’ll chase you with black fury’s
fire, when cold death has torn limbs from spirit,
my ghost will dog you everywhere. You’ll pay, wretch!
Word will reach me, I’ll hear it in the pit of Hades!”
She breaks off half-way, frenzied, shuns the open air,
turns, flees out of sight, leaving him with much
he meant to say, but in his shock leaving it unsaid.
Her maids support her, carry her in collapse
to her marble bedchamber and lay her on the couch.

`

More Poems by Virgil

  1. Turnus the wolf
  2. The farmer’s happy lot
  3. Signs of bad weather
  4. Aeneas prepares to tell Dido his story
  5. Laocoon and the snakes
  6. How Aeneas will know the site of his city
  7. The Trojans prepare to set sail from Carthage
  8. Aeneas’s ships are transformed
  9. Dido falls in love
  10. The Fury Allecto blows the alarm
  11. Aeneas reaches the Elysian Fields
  12. Hector visits Aeneas in a dream
  13. Virgil’s perils on the sea
  14. Storm at sea!
  15. The farmer’s starry calendar
  16. The Harpy’s prophecy
  17. A Fury rouses Turnus to war
  18. Help for Father Aeneas from Father Tiber
  19. Virgil’s poetic temple to Caesar
  20. Aeneas is wounded
  21. Dido and Aeneas: royal hunt and royal affair
  22. Juno is reconciled
  23. Sea-nymphs
  24. Love is the same for all
  25. The Syrian hostess
  26. Jupiter’s prophecy
  27. King Mezentius meets his match
  28. Fire strikes Aeneas’s fleet
  29. The death of Euryalus and Nisus
  30. The portals of sleep
  31. More from Virgil’s farming Utopia
  32. The Aeneid begins
  33. Palinurus the helmsman is lost
  34. Aeneas joins the fray
  35. Rumour
  36. Virgil predicts a forthcoming birth and a new golden age
  37. In King Latinus’s hall
  38. The natural history of bees
  39. The death of Pallas
  40. Aristaeus’s bees
  41. Aeneas arrives in Italy
  42. Charon, the ferryman
  43. Laocoon warns against the Trojan horse
  44. Catastrophe for Rome?
  45. Dido’s release
  46. The death of Dido.
  47. Virgil begins the Georgics
  48. The Trojans reach Carthage
  49. The Trojan Horse enters the city
  50. Mourning for Pallas
  51. New allies for Aeneas
  52. The journey to Hades begins
  53. Anchises’s ghost invites Aeneas to visit the underworld
  54. Aeneas sees Marcellus, Augustus’s tragic heir
  55. Aeneas tours the site of Rome
  56. Aeneas saves his son and father, but at a cost
  57. Vulcan’s forge
  58. Mercury’s journey to Carthage
  59. The death of Priam
  60. Turnus is lured away from battle
  61. Aeneas’s oath
  62. Souls awaiting punishment in Tartarus, and the crimes that brought them there.
  63. Aeneas’s vision of Augustus
  64. Juno throws open the gates of war
  65. Aeneas comes to the Hell of Tartarus
  66. Aeneas learns the way to the underworld
  67. King Latinus grants the Trojans’ request
  68. The infant Camilla
  69. Aeneas rescues his Father Anchises
  70. Omens for Princess Lavinia
  71. Turnus at bay
  72. Rites for the allies’ dead
  73. Aeneas finds Dido among the shades
    74. View Latin Poems