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The Aeneid of Virgil

The Aeneid

Death of Virgil

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There is in Rome a famous sculpture called the Bocca della Verita (Mouth of Truth) in the church of Santa Maria in Cosmedin. Legend has it that if you put your hand in the gaping mouth while you are harbouring a lie in your heart, your hand will be bitten off.

Consequently I suppose, millions of tourists in Rome have been able to convince their wives and husbands that they have no guilty secrets. I was in Rome for six hours once (on a strange mission – my one and only international trip – that I won’t elaborate on) and I stuck my paw in.

The bocca was, according to legend, made by the Latin poet, Virgil (Publius Vergilius Maro, 70 BCE - 19 BCE), a man whose real life became confused in the minds of medieval Europeans as one of supernatural powers, rather than the drudgery of writing epic poems. 

Because so much of myth and legend came to surround the man, it is sometimes hard to realise that he was in fact a real character, a man who wrote poetry. Raised in a rural area near Mantua, Italy, Virgil (or Vergil as it is sometimes spelt) was well educated and from the age of 31, lived either in Rome or near Naples, associated with his patron, Maecenas, Emperor Octavian's minister of internal affairs. Virgil became a court poet.
  
From quite early times, Virgil was said to be a magician, or a demi-god. His birthday, the Ides of October (October 15) 70 BCE, was, the writer Martial informs us, sacred to Virgil. 

As we explore at another part of this scriptorium (Gods and Saviours, and their similarities to Jesus Christ), Virgin birth is a recurring theme in ancient belief systems. Thus it comes as no surprise that as Virgil's legend grew, he was said to have had a divine father and a virgin mother, whose name, incidentally, is not unlike that of the mother of Jesus Christ:

Maia was very beautiful and before she married Stimichon her father kept her locked up in his villa. But Jove, who is called Maius (He Who is Great), saw her and fell in love. So He changed Himself into a shower of flakes of gold-leaf, which blew in through the window and settled in the wine that Maia held in a cup in her hand. She thought it was very beautiful, and thinking on what she knew of the alchemical Aurum Potabile (Drinkable Gold), that it would transform her life, she drank it quickly. Suddenly a tingling sensation filled her stomach, but then concentrated in her womb. Like a volcano that explodes and sends out streams of incandescent heat across the countryside, just so Maia's belly exploded in a burning pleasure that flowed out across her body. She writhed in agony and ecstasy until she was exhausted and fell asleep. When she awoke, she knew she was pregnant.*

Maia had dreams and visions that she would give birth to a laurel twig, so the seers consulted her brother, the famous philosopher Lucretius. He informed them that the child enjoyed the blessing of Phoebus Apollo and should be named Virgilius after the laurel twig (virgula laurea).

Virgil was born while Maia leaned against a terebinth tree. Like some ancient saviours and deities, Virgil did not cry at his birth; he could walk immediately and where he walked, blooming flowers sprang from the ground. He had a golden star on his forehead, had all his teeth and was very hairy, features believed in that place and at that time to indicate a supernatural being.

Virgil as magus

By medieval times, Virgil was almost completely a legendary figure; he was, in fact, seen as a magus, or sorcerer. For example, Conrad of Querfurt described in 1194 how Virgil endowed Naples with a model of the city enclosed in a bottle.
  
There are many fables about the great Roman poet whose birth was announced by an earthquake in Rome. 

The author of the Pastorals and the epic poem The Aeneid was said by Adenet le Rois (Adam Rex) in his Roman de Cléomadès, c. 1285, to have founded two cities (one of them Naples) upon eggs, as a magical charm for the cities' protection. On one of Naples's gateways he erected two statues: the first bore a happy face, the second a deformed and miserable one. If a traveller of old were to enter that Neapolitan portal near the happy statue, that person would prosper; if near the sad statue, suffering would be their lot. 

Virgil's fly statue and the griffin's egg

On another gate he erected a statue of a fly (Musca Magica, the Magic Fly), an image that rid Naples of flies for eight years. The story behind the fly is that Virgil asked a student of his, Marcus Claudius Marcellus (42 - 23 BCE), nephew and heir to the Roman emperor Augustus Caesar, whether Marcellus would rather have a bird that could kill birds, or a fly that could kill flies. Marcellus referred the question to his uncle, and, since Naples was at that time suffering a plague of flies, the emperor said that a fly would be a better asset than a bird. So Virgil, while the Second Aspect of Aquarius was in the Ascendant, had a statue of a fly made to astrological principles. After preparing the fly magically, he prayed over it to Muiagros (Fly Catcher), whom the Greeks call Apomuios (Averter of Flies), the God of Flies (Deus Muscarum). Over the ensuing centuries, armies invading Naples were said to have usually suffered from plagues of flies, and been defeated. 

Similarly, the poet/magus had constructed a magical griffin's egg (Ovum Incantatum Neapolis), one half shining yellow bronze with a golden image of the sun, the other midnight blue with a silver image of the moon, to aid with the consecration of the city of Naples.

Griffin (gryphon)

The egg was placed in an ampule (ampulla) and sealed with Hermetic incantations, thus making it a Hermetic Flask (Vas Hermeticum). The ampule in turn was placed in an iron cage which was supported by silver ribbons from four columns on a pillar of carved bronze. The Castel dell'Ovo (Castle of the Egg) was built on a promontory in the Bay of Naples, and the egg and its ampule were installed in a secret room in its basement. (In ancient times similar eggs supported on columns were displayed in the Roman circus, and nowadays ostrich eggs are suspended in tombs, churches and mosques.)   

Source

Virgil, emperors and kings

Troubled by rumours of insurrection, it is said, the Emperor of Rome called for help from the poet, who made for him a statue representing each of the Roman provinces, and one representing Rome. The former all turned their backs on the latter, and rang bells, thus warning the emperor of the coming rebellion. Centuries later, in 1061 CE the Norman conqueror Roger Guiscard (c.1031-1101) was able to subdue all of southern Italy except for Naples, which was protected by Virgil's ovo sacro (magic, or sacred, egg) and the Musca Magica.
  
Virgil’s primacy in Latin poetry was immediate and immense; in his own lifetime his books were classics, and before he was long dead his writings had become a major part of the western European canon. Within no more than three centuries his books were believed to be sacred, and were used for purposes of divination.

England’s Charles I, it was said, had a friend, Lord Falkland, who, to amuse the king, brought out a copy of Virgil’s work for divinatory purposes. Charles selected at random the passage, Book 4, 615-620; "evil wars would break out, and the king lose his life". To make light of such a weighty prognostication and show it in a ridiculous light, so as to placate his royal friend, Falkland stuck the pin in Book 11, 152-181; "the lament of Evander for the untimely death of his son Pallas". It was not long before King Charles heard news of the death of his friend who was slain at Newbury (1643) whilst Charles himself waited for his own execution.

The poet’s necromantic exploits are recounted in the Gesta Romanorum and numerous medieval poems and romances. From them we learn much about a fantastic character who, though he lived a remarkable life, we can only wish lived the life in which the medieval Europeans believed. 

Following his death on September 21, 19 BCE, the bones of Vergilius, like the relics of a Christian saint, became objects of reverence to medieval Europeans as well as enduring symbols with many tales told of them. English scholar Alexander of Neckam* (September 8, 1157 - 1217) wrote:

Then the people put the Bones in a leather bag [culleus] and took it to the Castrum Ovi [the Castello dell'Ovo or Castle of the Egg] and placed them for protection in a wooden Ark [Arcus ligneus] in the Shrine of the Egg [Sacellum Ovi] ... To this day Vergilius' Bones can be seen in the Castle, where they are protected by an iron cage. When the Bones are exposed, the wind wails and the sea is whipped into a frenzy, and this tempest continues until the bones are restored to their resting place. Many reputable people have verified this, including Conrad of Querfurt.*

Some say that Virgil was murdered, but this might be yet another example of the human inclination to invest the ordinary with intimations of the extraordinary – who knows? It would not be the first time : witness the startling claims made about the deaths of some modern 'heroes', such as John F Kennedy and Marilyn Monroe.

Knossos/Gnosis
Virgil was a real man who became like a deity. To the medieval mind he was a necromancer rather than a poet, just as magic powers were ascribed to many religious, scientific and even political figures of the medieval and ancient worlds. The bard became, in the popular imagination, a magus whose very epigrams (Gnômai) were living demons or gnomes (Gê-nomos) descended from the Cretan goddess of Knossos, Ariadne (aka Gnosis) – knowledge and spirit conflated.

The legacy of the medieval construction of Publius Vergilius Maro is, for us in the modern world, a charming collection of tales that bear no relation to the actual man of Mantua, but which reveal arcane meaning for those interested and patient enough to explore them.

And when Vergilius's initiation was completed, in his fourteenth year, he was sent to an ancient ruined temple on a quest for visions. After much fasting and prayer, he fell asleep, and a voice came to him, which claimed to be that of a Daemon imprisoned in an urn hidden under the stone on which Vergilius had placed his head. He awoke immediately and indeed found an urn under the stone. When it was opened, a beautiful Daemon, female in form, appeared and told Vergilius that there was also a Black Book of Spells (Volumen Nigrum Incantatorum) and a magic wand in the urn, which were Vergilius' reward. So he took them, and thus came into his maturity as a Magus.*

Virgil was large in person and stature, with a swarthy complexion, a peasant's brow, and uneven health, for he commonly suffered from pain in his stomach, throat, and head; indeed, he often spat up blood. He was sparing of food and wine. With regard to pleasure, he was partial to boys.
Aelius Donatus, Life of Virgil; tr. David Wilson-Okamura

* From The Secret History of Virgil by Alexander Neckam, said to be based on a history by Gaius Asinius Pollio; from a manuscript in the Old Royal Library in the British Museum. Edited and translated by Joannes Opsopoeus Brettanus, 1996

Index of articles on folklore and other topics

Two geniuses whose lives were touched by alchemist John Dee

St John's Eve, and its magickal herb, St John's wort

Night of the fairy goddesses

Emperor Domitian's predicted assassination 

Alchemists in the Almanac:  Cornelius Agrippa  Roger Bacon  Count Cagliostro  John Dee
Edward Kelley  Robert Fludd  Isaac Newton  Paracelsus  James Price  Tycho Brahe  Raymond Lulle  

External links

Suetonius: The Life of Virgil

Vita Vergiliana (in Latin)

Virgil.org: Aelius Donatus' Life of Virgil translated into English by David Wilson-Okamura

Works by P.+Vergilius+Maro at PP

Sacred Texts: Classics: The Works of Virgil

P. Vergilivs Maro at The Latin Library

Works by Virgil at Project Gutenberg

Virgil in Late Antiquity, the Middle Ages, and the Renaissance: an Online Bibliography

Was Virgil murdered?

The Secret History of Virgil

Quotes by Virgil at Wikiquote

More at Wikisource