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Servius on Virgil, Aeneid 6.532

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Servius, the 4th-century commentator on Virgil, is discussing the passage in the Underworld when the shade of Deiphobus asks Aeneas (6.531-4):

sed te qui vivum casus, age fare vicissim,
attulerint. pelagine venis erroribus actus
an monitu divum? an quae te fortuna fatigat,
ut tristis sine sole domos, loca turbida, adires?

But come, tell me in reply what misfortunes have brought you here alive? Do you come here driven by your wanderings on the sea, or at the gods’ bidding? Or else what fortune is wearying you, that you are entering these sad houses with no sunlight, these troubled places?

Servius’ comment quotes a few words from the work of his own approximate contemporary, the now rather obscure poet Tiberianus, which he has been reminded of by this passage of Virgil:

Tiberianus etiam inducit epistolam vento allatam ab antipodibus, quae habet ‘superi inferis salutem.’

Tiberianus too introduces a letter, brought [i.e. to the Underworld] by the wind from the Antipodes, which has these words: ‘Those above send greetings to those below.’

Written by aleatorclassicus

July 30, 2010 at 12:00 PM

Posted in Servius, Tiberianus, Virgil