sailing into Chaonia’s port and we finally reach
the hilltop town, Buthrotum.
“Here an incredible story
meets our ears: that Helenus, Priam’s son, holds sway
over these Greek towns, that he had won the throne
and wife of Pyrrhus, son of Achilles—Andromache
was wed once more to a man of Trojan stock.
Astonishing! My heart burned with longing,
irresistible longing to see my old friend
and learn about this remarkable twist of fate . . .
Setting out from the harbor, leaving ships and shore
I chanced to see Andromache pouring out libations
to the dead—the ritual foods, the gifts of grief—
in a grove before the city, banked by a stream
the exiles made believe was Simois River. Just now
tipping wine to her husband’s ashes, she implored
Hector’s shade to visit his tomb, an empty mound
of grassy earth, crowned with the double altars
she had blessed, a place to shed her tears.
As she saw me coming, flanked by Trojan troops,
she lost control, afraid of a wonder so extreme.
Watching, rigid, suddenly warmth leaves her bones,
she faints, and after a long pause barely finds
the breath to whisper: ‘That face, it’s really you?
You’re real, a messenger come my way? Son of the goddess—
still alive? Or if the light of life has left you,
where’s my Hector now?’
“Breaking off,
Andromache wept, her wailing filled the grove,
inconsolable. I could scarcely interject a word,
dismayed, I stuttered a few breathless phrases:
‘Alive, yes. Still dragging out my life . . .
through the worst the world can offer. Have no doubt,
what you see is real. Oh what fate has overpowered you,
robbed of such a husband? Or does fortune shine again
on you, Hector’s Andromache, just as you deserve?
Are you still married to Pyrrhus?’
“Eyes lowered,
her voice subdued, she murmured: ‘She was the one,
the happiest one of all, Priam’s virgin daughter
doomed to die at our enemy’s tomb—Achilles—
under the looming walls of Troy. No captive slave
allotted to serve the lust of a conquering hero’s bed!
But I, our home in flames, was shipped over strange seas,
I bowed to the high and mighty pride of Achilles’ son,
produced him a child—in slavery. Then, keen to marry
a Spartan bride, Hermione, granddaughter of Leda,
he turned me over to Helenus, slave to slave.
But Orestes burned with love for his stolen bride,
spurred by the Furies for his crimes, he seized Pyrrhus,
quite off guard, and butchered him at his father’s altar.
At Pyrrhus’ death, part of his kingdom passed to Helenus,
who named the plains Chaonian—all this realm, Chaonia,
after the Trojan Chaon, and built a Trojan fortress,
the Ilian stronghold rising on this ridge.
“‘But you,
what following winds, what Fates have sailed you here?
What god urged you, all unknowing, to our shores?
And what of your son, Ascanius? Still alive,
still breathing the breath of life? Your son,
whom in the old days at Troy . . .
does he still love his mother lost and gone?
Do his father Aeneas and uncle Hector fire his heart
with the old courage, his heroic forebears’ spirit?’
“A torrent of questions—weeping futile tears,
she sobs her long lament as Priam’s warrior son,
Helenus, comes from the walls with full cortege.
Recognizing his kin, he gladly leads us home,
each word of welcome breaking through his tears.
And I as I walk, I recognize a little Troy,
a miniature, mimicking our great Trojan towers,
and a dried-up brook they call the river Xanthus,
and I put my arms around a cutdown Scaean Gate.
And all my Trojans join me,
drinking deep of a Trojan city’s welcome.
The king ushered us into generous colonnades,
in the heart of the court we offered Bacchus wine
and feasted from golden plates, all cups held high.
“Now time wears on, day in, day out, and the breezes
lure our sails, a Southwind rippling in our canvas.
So I approach the prophet-king with questions:
‘Son of Troy and seer of the gods, you know the will
of Phoebus Apollo, know his Clarian tripods and his laurel,
know the stars, the cries of birds, the omens quick on the wing.
Please, tell me—all the signs foretold me a happy voyage,
yes, and the will of all the gods impels me now
to sail for Italy, seek that far-off land.
The Harpy Celaeno alone foretold a monstrous sign,
chanting out the unspeakable—withering wrath to come
and the ghastly pangs of famine. What dangers, tell me,
to steer away from first? What course to set
to master these ordeals?’
“At that, Helenus
first performs a sacrifice, slaughters many bulls.
He prays the gods for peace, he looses the sacred ribbons
round his hallowed head and taking me by the hand
he leads me to your shrine, Apollo, stirred with awe
by your vibrant power, and at once this prophecy
comes singing from the priest’s inspired lips:
‘Son of the goddess, surely proof is clear,
the highest sanctions shine upon your voyage.
So the King of the Gods has sorted out your fate,
so rolls your life, as the world rolls through its changes.
Now, few out of many truths I will reveal to you,
so you can cross the welcoming seas more safely,
moor secure in a Latian harbor. The Fates
have forbidden Helenus to know the rest.
Saturnian Juno says I may not speak a word . . .
“‘First, that Italian land you think so near—
all unknowing, planning to ease into its harbors—
lies far off. A long wandering path will part you
miles from that shore by a lengthy stretch of coast.
So, first you must bend your oar in Sicilian seas
and cross in your ships the salt Italian waves,
the lakes of the Underworld and Aeaea, Circe’s isle,
before you can build your city safe on solid ground.
I will give you a sign. Guard it in your heart.
When at an anxious time by a secret river’s run,
under the oaks along the bank you find a great sow
stretched on her side with thirty pigs just farrowed,
a snow-white mother with snow-white young at her dugs:
that will be the place to found your city, there
your repose from labor lies. No reason to fear
that prophecy, the horror of eating your own platters.
The Fates will find the way. Apollo comes to your call.
“‘But set sail from our land, steer clear of Italy’s coast,
the closest coast to our own, washed by our own seas—
every seaboard town is manned by hostile Greeks.
Here the Narycian Locri built their walls
and troops of Cretan Idomeneus from Lyctos
commandeered the Sallentine level fields.
Here little Petelia built by Philoctetes,
the Meliboean chief, lies safe behind
its walls.
Once you have passed them all, moored your ships
on the far shore and set up altars on the beach
to perform your vows, then cloak yourselves in purple,
veil your heads, so while the hallowed fires are burning
in honor of the gods, no enemy presence can break in
and disrupt the omens. Your comrades, you yourself
must hold fast to this sacred rite, this custom.
Your sons’ sons must keep it pure forever.
“‘Now then,
launching out as the wind bears you toward Sicilian shores
and Pelorus’ crowded headlands open up a passage,
steer for the lands to port, the seas to port,
in a long southern sweep around the coast,
but stay clear of the heavy surf to starboard.
These lands, they say, were once an immense unbroken mass
but long ago—such is the power of time to work great change
as the ages pass—some vast convulsion sprang them apart,
a surge of the sea burst in between them, cleaving
Sicily clear of Hesperia’s flanks, dividing lands
and towns into two coasts, rushing between them
down a narrow tiderip.
“‘But now Scylla to starboard
blocks your way, with never-sated Charybdis off to port—
three times a day, into the plunging whirlpool of her abyss
she gulps down floods of sea, then heaves them back in the air,
pelting the stars with spray. Scylla lurks in her blind cave,
thrusting out her mouths and hauling ships on her rocks.
She’s human at first glance, down to the waist a girl
with lovely breasts, but a monster of the deep below,
her body a writhing horror, her belly spawns wolves
flailing with dolphins’ tails. Better to waste time,
skirting Sicily then in a long arc rounding Cape Pachynus,
than once set eyes on gruesome Scylla deep in her cave,
her rocks booming with all her sea-green hounds.
“‘What’s more,
if a prophet has second sight, if Helenus earns your trust
and Apollo fills his soul with truth, one prophecy, one
above all, son of the goddess, I will make to you,
over and over repeat this warning word. Revere
great Juno’s power first in all your prayers,
to Juno chant your vows with a full heart and win
the mighty goddess over with gifts to match your vows.
Only then can you leave Sicilian shores at last,
dispatched to Italy’s coast, a conquering hero.
Once ashore, when you reach the city of Cumae
and Avernus’ haunted lakes and murmuring forests,
there you will see the prophetess in her frenzy,
chanting deep in her rocky cavern, charting the Fates,
committing her vision to words, to signs on leaves.
Whatever verses the seer writes down on leaves
she puts in order, sealed in her cave, left behind.
There they stay, motionless, never slip from sequence.
But the leaves are light—if the door turns on its hinge,
the slightest breath of air will scatter them all about
and she never cares to retrieve them, flitting through her cave,
or restore them to order, join them as verses with a vision.
So visitors may depart, deprived of her advice,
and hate the Sibyl’s haunts.
“‘But never fear delay,
though crewmen press you hard and the course you set
calls out to your sails to take the waves, and you could
fill those sails with good fair winds. Still you must
approach her oracle, beg the seer with prayers
to chant her prophecies, all of her own accord,
unlock her lips and sing with her own voice.
She will reveal to you the Italian tribes,
the wars that you must fight, and the many ways
to shun or shoulder each ordeal that you must meet.
Revere her power and she will grant safe passage.
That far I may go with my words of warning.
Now sail on. By your own brave work exalt
our Trojan greatness to the skies.’
“Friendly words,
and when he had closed, the prophet ordered presents,
hoards of gold and ivory inlays, brought to our ships,
crowding our holds with a massive weight of silver,
Dodona cauldrons, a breastplate linked with mail
and triple-meshed in gold, a magnificent helmet
peaked with a plumed crest—Neoptolemus’ arms—
and then the gifts of honor for my father.
He adds horses too, pilots to guide our way,
fills out our crews, rearms our fighting comrades.
“Meanwhile Anchises gave the command to spread sail,
no time to waste, we’d lose the good fair winds,
and Apollo’s seer addressed him with deep respect:
‘Anchises, worthy to wed the proudest, Venus herself,
how the gods do love you. Twice they plucked you safe
from the ruins of Troy. Italy waits you now, look,
sail on and make it yours!
But first you must hurry past the coastline here,
the part of Italy that the god unfolds for you
lies far at sea. “Set sail now,” the god commands,
“blest in the dedication of your son.” Enough.
Why waste time with talk when the wind is rising?’
“Andromache grieves no less at our final parting.
She brings out robes shot through with gilded thread
and a Phrygian cloak for Ascanius. Not to be outdone
in kindness, weighing him down with woven gifts
she says: ‘Please take these as well, the work
of my hands, reminders of me to you, dear boy,
and tokens of my love . . .
the love of Hector’s Andromache that never dies.
Take them. The last gifts from your own people.
You are the only image of my Astyanax that’s left.
His eyes, his hands, his features, so like yours—
he would be growing up now, just your age.’
“Turning
to leave, my tears brimmed and I said a last farewell:
‘Live on in your blessings, your destiny’s been won!
But ours calls us on from one ordeal to the next.
You’ve earned your rest at last. No seas to plow,
no questing after Italian fields forever
receding on the horizon. Now you see before you
Xanthus and Troy in replica, built with your own hands,
under better stars, I trust, and less exposed to the Greeks.
If I ever reach the Tiber, the fields on Tiber’s banks,
and see my people secure behind their promised walls,
then of our neighboring kin and kindred cities, both
in Epirus and Hesperia—both have the same founder,
Dardanus, the same fate too—someday we will make
our peoples one, one Troy in heart and soul.
Let this mission challenge all our children.’
“North we sail and skirt Ceraunia’s cliffs
to the narrow straits, the shortest route to Italy,
while the sun sinks and darkness shrouds the hills.
Landing, drawing lots for tomorrow’s stint at the oars,
we stretch out in the lap of welcome land at water’s edge
and scattered along the dry beach refresh ourselves
as sleep comes streaming through our weary bodies.
Night, drawn by the Hours, approaches mid-career
when Palinurus, on the alert, l
eaps up from bed
to test the winds, his ears keen for the first stir,
scanning the constellations wheeling down the quiet sky,
Arcturus, the rainy Hyades and the Great and Little Bears,
his eyes roving to find Orion geared in gold. And then,
when he sees the entire sky serene, all clear,
he gives the trumpet signal from his stern
and we strike camp at once,
set out on our way and spread our canvas wings.
“The dawn was a red glow now, putting stars to flight
as we glimpse the low-lying hills, dim in the distance . . .
Italy. ‘Italy!’—Achates was first to shout the name—
‘Italy!’ comrades cried out too with buoyant hearts.
Father Anchises crowned a great bowl with wreaths,
brimmed it with unmixed wine,
and standing tall in the stern, he prayed the gods:
‘You Powers that rule the land and sea and storms,
grant us wind for an easy passage, blow us safe to port!’
As the wind we pray for quickens, a harbor opens wide and
closer till we can see Minerva’s temple on the heights.
Shipmates furl the sails and swing the prows toward land.
The harbor curves like a bow, bent by Eastern combers,
rocky breakwaters foam with the salt surf spray,
the haven’s just behind them. Towering cliffs
fling out their arms like steep twin walls
and the temple rests securely back from shore.
“Here I saw it—our first omen: four horses,
snow-white, cropping the grasslands far and wide.
‘War!’ Father Anchises calls out, ‘Land of welcome,
that’s what you bring us, true, horses are armed for war,
these pairs of horses threaten war. But then again,
the same beasts are trained to harness as teams
and bow to the yoke, at one with bit and bridle.
There’s hope for peace as well.’
“At once we pray
to the force of Pallas, goddess of clashing armies,
the first to receive our band of happy men.
We stand at the altar, heads under Trojan veils,
and following Helenus’ orders first and foremost,
duly burn our offerings, just as bidden,
to Juno, Queen of Argos.
“No time for delay.
Our rites complete, at once we swing our sails
to the wind on yardarm spars and put astern
this home of Greeks, the fields we dare not trust.
First we sight the Gulf of Tarentum, Hercules’ town,
The Aeneid Page 14