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Revisiting Evander at Aeneid 8.363

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 February 2009

Roger Rees
Roger Rees
Affiliation:
University of St. Andrews
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Extract

The purpose of this note is to revive Servius Auctus' interpretation of Aeneid 8.363, which has been overlooked or dismissed without argument by recent scholars. It concerns the identification and location of Evander's regia. The relevant lines are worth quoting in full (359–67):

There has been general agreement amongst scholars this century that the building is to be understood to be occupying the same place—or thereabouts—as that later to be taken by Augustus' house. It is now established that this was on the South-West of the Palatine.

Type
Shorter Notes
Information
The Classical Quarterly , Volume 46 , Issue 2 , December 1996 , pp. 583 - 586
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 1996

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References

1 E.g.Fowler, W.W., Aeneas at the site of Rome (Oxford, 1917), 72;Google ScholarEden, P.T., Aeneid 8 (Leiden, 1975), 104;Google ScholarGransden, K.W., Aeneid 8 (Cambridge, 1976), 30;Google ScholarFordyce, C.J., Aeneid 7 and 8 (Oxford, 1977), 246.Google Scholar

2 Richmond, O.L., ‘The Augustan Palatium’, JRS 4(1914), 193–226 makes the identification, accepted by e.g.Google ScholarNash, E., Pictorial Dictionary of Ancient Rome vol. 1 (London, 1961), 310 andGoogle ScholarPatterson, J., ‘The City of Rome; from Republic to Empire’, JRS 82 (1992), 186–215;Google ScholarHenry, E., ‘Virgil and the Monuments’, PVS 18 (1986), 19–45; cf. Fowler 75 andGoogle ScholarBishop, J.H., ‘Palatine Apollo’, CQ NS 6 (1956), 187–92.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

3 Carettoni, G., Das Haus des Augustus aufdem Palatin (Mainz, 1983); id. on the wallpaintings in the building in Kaiser Augustus und die verlorene Republik (Berlin 1988), pp. 287–90;Google ScholarZanker, P., The Power of Images in the Age of Augustus (Ann Arbor, 1988), 51f. and 67f.Google Scholar

4 Brown, F.E., ‘New Soundings in the Regia; the evidence for the early epublic’, Entretiens Hardt 13 (1967), 47–64 concludes that the Regia was built not for a rex but a rex sacrificulus, and not as a dwelling place but as a site for sacred rites. See alsoGoogle ScholarWeinstock, S., Divus Julius (Oxford, 1971), pp.279–80Google Scholar and cf.Coarelli, F., II Foro Romano (Rome, 1983), 61. For consideration of Servius' general reliability seeGoogle ScholarWilliams, R.D., ‘Servius—Commentator and Guide’, PVS 6 (1966–7), 50–6. Plutarch, Numa 14.1, mentions the construction of the Regia; at 9.1 Plutarch says that Numa instituted the office of Pontifex and was himself the first of them.Google Scholar

5 Williams, R.D., Aeneid 7–12 (London, 1973);Google Scholar Eden, Gransden and Fordyce, op. cit. (n. 1).Wiseman, T.P., ‘Cybele, Virgil and Augustus’, in A.J., Woodman and D.A., West (eds.), Poetry and Politics in the Age of Augustus (Cambridge, 1984), 117–28 sees an allusion to the piety and frugality of Numa in the word regia.Google Scholar

6 Nash, op. cit. (n. 2), vol. 2 (London, 1962), 264f. The location of the Regia actually permits of an extraordinary compromise between the interpretations of Servius Auctus and Richmond:Wiseman, T.P., ‘The Public Image of Aristocratic and Imperial Houses’, in L'Urbs—espace urbain et histoire, Collection de Tecole Francais de Rome 98 (1987).393–413, reprinted in Historiography and Imagination (Exeter, 1994), 98–115 describes how, from the 30's B.C., Octavian bought up land and houses between his house on the Palatine and the Temple of Vesta, intent on creating a palace complex spanning the entire area. According to this grand plan, he might have intended to incorporate the Regia in his scheme. Wiseman cites the dedication in honorem domus Auguslae, discovered on the wall of the Regia and suggests the terminus ante quern of 12 B.C. for Augustus' rejection of this plan.Google Scholar

7 Cf.Fordyce, 246 and Richmond, ‘Palatine Apollo Again’, CQ NS 8 (1958), 180–4, pp.181–2.Google Scholar

8 E.g. 2.31.4 subeundum erat adhostes; 4.22.5 subeundo admoenia; 9.37.3 ad vallum subeunt; 31.45.4 ad urbem subeunt; 34.46.7 subiere ad vallum.

9 Terrenato, N., ‘Velia and Carinae: some observations on an area of Archaic Rome’, in E., Herring, R., Whitehouse, J., Wilkins (eds.), Papers of the Fourth Conference of Italian Archaeology 4 (London, 1992), 31–47, at 33–4.Google Scholar

10 Coarelli 26–33; Terrenato 33; Wiseman (1987), 403–4.

11 Wiseman (1984), 123; Varro, De Lingua Latina 5.164.

12 Richmond–s assertion that the distance between the Forum and the domus Augusta is covered in the phrase ut ventum ad sedes (362) because ‘Virgil has nothing to remark’ (1958, 181), in which he is tacitly followed by Gransden, is an unconvincing challenge to the claims of likelihood.

13 Cf. Richmond (1958), 182.

14 Nash (1962), 264; Zanker 66.

15 Brown, F.E., ‘Of Huts and Houses’ in L., Bonfante and H. von, Heintze (eds.), In Memoriam: Brendel, O.J. (Mainz, 1976), 5–12 says that buildings like the Regia recalled the primitive virtues such as piety, probity and austerity.Google Scholar

16 Macrobius, Sat. 3.2.17 pontificem Aenean…ostendil';Rose, H.J., Aeneas Pontifex, (London, 1948).Google Scholar Servius Auctus' identification of the Regia does not claim to suggest a foreshadowing of the adoption of the position of Pontifex Maximus by the emperor, as Augustus did not assume the office until 12 B.C. (Res Geslae 10), although Rose (3) doubts that his intentions were kept secret even before Vergil's death.

17 My thanks to Roy Gibson, Roger Green, James Morwood, Christopher Smith, Peter Wiseman, and the referee.