Epic Poetry: Archaic, Classical, and Roman National Epic
Epic Poetry: A Narrative in Verse
Epic poetry is a narrative in verse where the poet sings of the exploits of a hero. The earliest appearances of this genre were unwritten and expressed in festivals, military victories, banquets, and funerals.
The Archaic Epic
The first epic was Odussia by Livius Andronicus, a translation of Homer’s Odyssey. The metric is typical Latin, using Saturnian verse, of which about 50 verses are preserved.
Nevio is considered the first original epic poet. His poem, Bellum Punicum, recounts the First Punic War and his military experiences as a soldier. Nevio recounts a real historical and contemporary event, written in Saturnian verse with Hellenistic and Roman influences.
Ennio wrote the Annales, which consisted of thirty thousand lines, of which only 600 remain. It narrated events from the destruction of Troy to the second century BC. Ennio introduced the Greek hexameter, abandoning the Saturnian verse forever.
Classical Epic
Virgil was born in 70 BC. He extended his studies in Rome and joined the circle of Maecenas and was toasted in Augusto. He died in 19 BC. He did not finish the Aeneid to his liking and ordered it to be burned, but his wishes were ignored, and it was published as he left it. He also wrote The Georgics and Eclogues.
The Aeneid
The Aeneid is the great Roman national epic. It consists of 12 books and nearly ten thousand hexameters. Virgil imitates Homer’s Odyssey in the first 6 books and the Iliad in the last 6.
The first half narrates Aeneas’ journey from Troy to Italy, though not in chronological order. The poem begins with Aeneas and his companions attempting to reach Italy from Sicily, but the goddess Juno, an enemy of the Trojans, asks the wind god Aeolus to unleash a storm that takes Aeneas to the shores of Africa, where he is hosted by Queen Dido of Carthage.
In Book II, Aeneas tells Dido about the taking and destruction of Troy. The 3rd book recounts his adventures from leaving Troy to the present time. The 4th book covers Aeneas’ stay in Carthage and his love for Dido, his departure, and Dido’s suicide. The 5th book discusses the funeral games in Sicily to mark the 1st anniversary of the death of his father, Anchises. The 6th book narrates his arrival in Italy and Aeneas’ descent into hell, where his father tells him about his mission.
The second half of the poem sings of the wars on Italian soil between Aeneas and Turnus, the chief of the Rutulians, ending with Turnus’ death at the hands of Aeneas.
The story of Rome becomes the key issue of Virgil’s epic, inserting the glorification of the Augustus family. The Aeneid is a work conceived for the glorification of Rome.
Ovid and Metamorphoses
Publio Ovidio Nason (43 BC – 17 AD) was from Sulmona and studied in Rome and the literary circle of Mecenas. His great mythological poem, Metamorphoses, consists of 15 books written in hexameters and narrates changes in form, both mythological and historical, chronologically. Love is the protagonist and the source of food.
The story begins with the four ages of the world, in which they express the love of the gods. Books VI to XI narrate loves among mortals and ends with the death of Julius Caesar, deified and transformed into a constellation.
Ovid was exiled to the Black Sea by Emperor Augustus for unclear reasons. He may have been exiled for his poem Ars Amatoria because the emperor believed it referenced his daughter Julia. Ovid died in Tomis after 10 years of exile.