The Æneid of Virgil translated into English proseVirgil
General
The Æneid of Virgil translated into English prose
Virgil
Aeneas (Legendary character); Epic poetry, Latin -- Translations into English; Legends -- Rome
Capys kills Privernus: Themilla’s flying spear had grazed
him first; he, poor fool, dropped his buckler and clapped
his hand to the wound, so the arrow came on stealthy
wing, and the hand was pinned to the left side, and the
inmost seat of breath is rent asunder by the deadly wound. 30
There stood the son of Arcens in conspicuous armour,
his scarf embroidered with needlework, in the glory of
Hiberian purple, fair of form, sent to war by his father
Arcens, who had reared him in his mother’s grove by the
streams of Symæthus, where stands Palicus’ rich and 35
gracious altar: flinging his spears aside, Mezentius
whirled the strained thong of the whizzing sling thrice
round his head, and with the molten bullet burst in twain
the forehead of the fronting foe, and stretched him at
full length on the expanse of sand.
Then first, they say, Ascanius levelled in war his winged
arrow, used till then to terrify the beasts of chase, and
laid low by strength of hand the brave Numanus, Remulus 5
by surname, who had lately won and wedded Turnus’
younger sister. He was stalking in front of the host,
vaunting aloud things meet and unmeet to tell, in the
insolence of new-blown royalty, and venting his pride in
clamorous tones: “Are ye not ashamed to be imprisoned 10
yet again in leaguer and rampart, twice-captured Phrygians,
and to put your walls between you and death? Lo, these
are the men who demand our wives at the sword’s edge!
What god, what madness, has driven you to Italy? You
will not find the Atridæ here, nor Ulysses the forger of 15
speech. A hardy race even from the stock, we bring our
sons soon as born to the river’s side, and harden them with
the water’s cruel cold. Our boys spend long days in the
chase, and weary out the forest; their sport is to rein the
steed, and level shafts from the bow. Our youth, strong 20
to labour and schooled by want, subdues the earth with
the rake, or shakes the city’s walls with battle. All our
life we ply the steel; with the butt of our spears we belabour
our cattle; old age, which dulls all else, impairs
not the force of our hearts or changes our fresh vigour; 25
the hoary head is clasped by the helmet; our constant
joy is to bring home new booty and live by rapine. Yours
are embroidered garments of saffron and gleaming purple;
sauntering and sloth are your delight; your pleasure is to
indulge the dance; your tunics have sleeves and your turbans 30
strings. Phrygian dames in sooth—for Phrygian
men ye are not—get you to the heights of Dindymus,
where the pipe utters its two-doored note to your accustomed
ears. The Idæan mother’s cymbals, the Berecyntian
flute, are calling you to the revel; leave arms to 35
men, and meddle no more with steel.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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