The Foundations of Rome
Aenea, in Greek mythology, was a minor Trojan hero in the conflict between the Greeks and the Trojans. He was the son of Anchises and the goddess Aphrodite, who had prophesied before his birth that the child would one day rule over the Trojans and be the ancestor of an everlasting dynasty. Fom at least as early as the 3 rd century BC, Aeneas was celebrated in Rome as the mythical founder of the Roman race; and the story of that foundation was told in the greatest of all Latin epic poems, Virgils Aeneid, written in the 1 st century BS.
When the Greeks destroyed the city of Troy, Aeneas escaped alive, carrying his father on his back, and in his arms was his son (Ascanius) and the images of his ancestral gods. He embarked on a long and dangerous voyage around the Mediterranean (the aged Anchises died en route_, eventually reaching Cumae on the shores of Italy. There he first of all consulted the Sibyl, a priestess of Apollo, who acted as his guide on a visit to the underworld. Accoring to Virgil, he was here reunited with his father, who told him of the future greatness of the race he was destined to found, and shoed him the sould of famous Romans of the future, waiting to be born.
From Cumae Aeneas set sail again, and landed in the Italian kingdom of Latium, where the king, Latinus, promised him the hand of his daughter Lavinia. An oracle had decleared that she would marry a foreign prince. However, Lavinia had earlier been betrothed to Turnus, leader of another Italian tribe, the Rutilians. Partly as a result of this insult to Turnus, war broke out, in the course of which Aanus and Latinus made an alliance with Ecander, king of Pallanteum, the site of the future city of Rome. Eventually Aeneas killed Turnus in single combat.
Virgil's poem ends with the defeat of Turnus, but there were carious traditions that told the rest of the story of the creation of Aeneas' dynasty. A few of these made Aeneas the founder of Rome itself. But more commonly it was said that Aeneas established the town of Lavinium; and that his son Ascanius founded a second town, Alba Longa.
The purpose of these versions, whereby Aeneas and Ascanium became the founders of the first "pre-Roman" Trojan settlements in Italy, was no doubt to make the story of Aeneas compatible with the other account of Rome's foundation, by Romulus, who was descended from the royal line of Alba Longa.
Aeneas became an important symbol of Roman moral values - notable the piety shown by the heroic rescue of his father, and the perseverance and sense of duty that marked his early struggles to found the Roman race. This symblism was particularly stressed in the reign of the emperor Augustus, whose family claimed direct descent from Aeneas. In one of his most magnificent building schemes, the "Forum of Augustus", the emperor displayed statues not only of Aeneas but also of Ascanius, the subsequent kings of Albe Longa, and the other ancestors who represented his direct link with Rome's Founder.
Virgils story of Aeneas includes an accound of his love affair with the Cartaginian queen, Dido. In earlier versions of Dido's story, Aeneas probably played no part; by bringing the two characters together, Virgil created one of the most renowned Roman legends of all.
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