Prologue of Virgil’s Aeneid Essay Example

of Rome which later becomes the Roman Empire’s Capital city. This courage to search for a new home for his family and friends describes Aeneas as a great man. The theme is clearly seen in the third, fourth and the fifth lines in the poem: ‘Long labours, both by sea and land he bore, and in the doubtful war, before he won the Latian realm, and built the destined town’ (Virgil 1). The lines show how difficult was for the man to explore the new home for his future generations.

The theme of supernatural powers is also extensively brought out in the poem. In the sixth line: ‘That lasting hate, of Juno’, Aeneas believes that Juno is the source of all this ill fated incidents affecting the Trojans. Several gods are mentioned throughout the story, for instance, Jupiter, Juno and Venus. Aeneas calls it the force of uncontrolled hunger which the goddess had. Goddess hugger comes from the opposing force between Juno and the Trojans over the city of Carthage. The deaths reported show how supernatural power is inevitable and cannot be revoked. One aspect of epic expressed in this theme is the comparison of a storm of sea with civil war. This is because Virgil compares an aspect of human being to another aspect of nature.

In conclusion, the prologue of Virgil’s Aeneid explores three main themes: A great courageous man, war and the power of the supernatural. The themes are interconnected in the story and they all influence the outcome of each other. The nature of the war has been used to explain how strong Aeneas is, while the power of the goddess is

blamed for the origin of the war.