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Notes Display Latin text | translated by Theodore C. Williams Book VII Chapter 17: Amata organizes a Bacchanic frenzy | Next chapter Return to index Previous chapter |
But she sees her lord Latinus resolute, her words an effort vain; and through her body spreads the Fury's deeply venomed viper-sting. Then, woe-begone, by dark dreams goaded on, she wanders aimless, fevered and unstrung along the public ways; as oft one sees beneath the twisted whips a leaping top sped in long spirals through a palace-close by lads at play: obedient to the thong, it weaves wide circles in the gaping view of its small masters, who admiring see the whirling boxwood made a living thing under their lash. So fast and far she roved from town to town among the clansmen wild. Then to the wood she ran, feigning to feel the madness Bacchus loves; for she essays a fiercer crime, by fiercer frenzy moved. Now in the leafy dark of mountain vales she hides her daughter [Note 1], ravished thus away from Trojan bridegroom and the wedding-feast. “Hail, Bacchus! Thou alone,” she shrieked and raved, “art worthy such a maid. For thee she bears the thyrsus with soft ivy-clusters crowned, and trips ecstatic in thy beauteous choir. For thee alone my daughter shall unbind the glory of her virgin hair.” Swift runs the rumor of her deed; and, frenzy-driven, the wives of Latium to the forests fly, enkindled with one rage. They leave behind their desolated hearths, and let rude winds o'er neck and tresses blow; their voices fill the welkin with convulsive shriek and wail; and, with fresh fawn-skins on their bodies bound, they brandish vine-clad spears. The Queen herself lifts high a blazing pine tree, while she sings a wedding-song for Turnus and her child. With bloodshot glance and anger wild, she cries: “Ho! all ye Latin wives, if e'er ye knew kindness for poor Amata, if ye care for a wronged mother's woes, O, follow me! Cast off the matron fillet from your brows, and revel to our mad, voluptuous song.” Thus, through the woodland haunt of creatures wild, Alecto urges on the raging Queen with Bacchus' cruel goad. Note 1: daughter = Lavinia Events: The Gods interfere in the Aeneid, The bacchanalia, Aeneas comes to Latium |
373-405 His ubi nequiquam dictis experta Latinum contra stare uidet, penitusque in uiscera lapsum serpentis furiale malum totamque pererrat, tum uero infelix ingentibus excita monstris immensam sine more furit lymphata per urbem. ceu quondam torto uolitans sub uerbere turbo, quem pueri magno in gyro uacua atria circum intenti ludo exercent—ille actus habena curuatis fertur spatiis; stupet inscia supra impubesque manus mirata uolubile buxum; dant animos plagae: non cursu segnior illo per medias urbes agitur populosque ferocis. quin etiam in siluas simulato numine Bacchi maius adorta nefas maioremque orsa furorem euolat et natam frondosis montibus abdit, quo thalamum eripiat Teucris taedasque moretur, euhoe Bacche fremens, solum te uirgine dignum uociferans: etenim mollis tibi sumere thyrsos, te lustrare choro, sacrum tibi pascere crinem. fama uolat, furiisque accensas pectore matres idem omnis simul ardor agit noua quaerere tecta. deseruere domos, uentis dant colla comasque; ast aliae tremulis ululatibus aethera complent pampineasque gerunt incinctae pellibus hastas. ipsa inter medias flagrantem feruida pinum sustinet ac natae Turnique canit hymenaeos sanguineam torquens aciem, toruumque repente clamat: 'io matres, audite, ubi quaeque, Latinae: si qua piis animis manet infelicis Amatae gratia, si iuris materni cura remordet, soluite crinalis uittas, capite orgia mecum.' talem inter siluas, inter deserta ferarum reginam Allecto stimulis agit undique Bacchi. |