Aeneid Book 2, lines 286-313

Hector visits Aeneas in a dream

by Virgil

Sinon, a Greek agent who has infiltrated the Trojans, has released the warriors hidden in the wooden horse. The sack of Troy is starting, and what an electrifying piece of writing it will be. But Virgil has a problem to solve. Epic heroes stand and fight: how can Aeneas flee without forfeiting his honour and mystique? Here, the dead Hector, Troy’s supreme fighting hero, begins the groundwork. He comes to Aeneas in a dream and tells him that the city must fall. Aeneas’s duty is not to die vainly, but to take responsibility for Troy’s sacred relics and bring them safely to a new home. Aeneas wakes and finds himself confronted by a terrible reality.

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ille nihil, nec me quaerentem vana moratur,
sed graviter gemitus imo de pectore ducens,
“heu fuge, nate dea, teque his”, ait, “eripe flammis.
hostis habet muros; ruit alto a culmine Troia.
sat patriae Priamoque datum: si Pergama dextra
defendi possent, etiam hac defensa fuissent.
sacra suosque tibi commendat Troia penates:
hos cape fatorum comites, his moenia quaere
magna, pererrato statues quae denique ponto.”
sic ait et manibus vittas Vestamque potentem
aeternumque adytis effert penetralibus ignem.
diverso interea miscentur moenia luctu,
et magis atque magis, quamquam secreta parentis
Anchisae domus arboribusque obtecta recessit,
clarescunt sonitus armorumque ingruit horror.
excutior somno et summi fastigia tecti
ascensu supero atque arrectis auribus asto:
in segetem veluti cum flamma furentibus Austris
incidit, aut rapidus montano flumine torrens
sternit agros, sternit sata laeta boumque labores,
praecipitesque trahit silvas: stupet inscius alto
accipiens sonitum saxi de vertice pastor.
Tum vero manifesta fides, Danaumque patescunt
insidiae. iam Deiphobi dedit ampla ruinam,
Vulcano superante domus; iam proximus ardet
Ucalegon; Sigea igni freta lata relucent:
exoritur clamorque virum clangorque tubarum.

He says nothing and ignores my empty questions,
but drawing deep and heavy groans, says “Ah, flee,
Goddess-born, snatch yourself from these flames.
the enemy has the walls; Troy crashes from its zenith.
Enough has been given for Troy and Priam: if the citadel
were defensible by deeds, mine would have defended it.
Her sacred relics and her Gods, Troy entrusts to you:
take them to share your fate, seek them a stronghold, one
you will found when long journeys on the sea are done.”
Next, in his hands he brings great Vesta, her priests’
bands and the eternal flame from the holy of holies.
Meanwhile, in the city cries of grief and confusion reign,
and more and more, though my Father Anchises’ house
is secluded and screened by trees, the noise grows
louder, and the grim sound of battle intensifies.
Torn from sleep, I climb to the very top of the roof
and stand listening intently: it is as though flame
were tearing into cornfields as south winds rage, swift
torrents from a mountain river laying flat the fields,
the thriving crops and the fruits of the oxen’s labour,
smashing the woodlands down: confused and dumbstruck,
the shepherd faces the din from the top of his rock.
Now the Greeks’ honour is clear, their betrayals laid
bare. Deiphobus’ mansion, Vulcan’s fire towering above,
has fallen in ruin: by it burns the house of Ucalegon;
the broad Sigean strait blazes with reflected light:
up go the shouts of men and the blare of trumpets.

`

More Poems by Virgil

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