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Quote of the day: Appius Claudius, he said, alone was outs
Notes
Display Latin text
The Aeneid by Virgil
translated by Theodore C. Williams
Book VI Chapter 13: Halls of monsters
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There in the middle court a shadowy elm
Its ancient branches spreads, and in its leaves
Deluding visions ever haunt and cling.
Then come strange prodigies of bestial kind :
Centaurs are stabled there, and double shapes
Like Scylla, or the dragon Lerna bred,
With hideous scream; Briareus clutching far
His hundred hands, Chimaera girt with flame,
A crowd of Gorgons, Harpies of foul wing,
And giant Geryon's triple-monstered shade.
Aeneas, shuddering with sudden fear,
Drew sword and fronted them with naked steel;
And, save his sage conductress bade him know
These were but shapes and shadows sweeping by,
His stroke had cloven in vain the vacant air.

Event: Aeneas visits the Underworld

282-294
in medio ramos annosaque bracchia pandit
ulmus opaca, ingens, quam sedem Somnia uulgo
uana tenere ferunt, foliisque sub omnibus haerent.
multaque praeterea uariarum monstra ferarum,
Centauri in foribus stabulant Scyllaeque biformes
et centumgeminus Briareus ac belua Lernae
horrendum stridens, flammisque armata Chimaera,
Gorgones Harpyiaeque et forma tricorporis umbrae.
corripit hic subita trepidus formidine ferrum
Aeneas strictamque aciem uenientibus offert,
et ni docta comes tenuis sine corpore uitas
admoneat uolitare caua sub imagine formae,
inruat et frustra ferro diuerberet umbras.