1. INTRODUCTION TO A NEGLECTED QUESTIONFootnote ¹

At the beginning of Aeneid 12, a truce is agreed so that Aeneas and Turnus can fight each other in single combat (12.161-215). But this truce is violated through the instigation of Turnus’ sister Juturna (222–56), who in turn has been instigated by Juno (134–60). The Italian Tolumnius casts a spear that kills an Etruscan warrior (257–82). Aeneas pleads for calm and the maintenance of the truce, but he in turn is wounded by an arrow (311–23). Turnus, seeing the Trojans in disarray, rushes into battle, and a general engagement ensues (324–82). So Turnus, even if he did not instigate the breach, does nothing to heal it, and for that reason alone (in the eyes of some commentators)Footnote ² is a criminal, who deserves his ultimate death at the hands of Aeneas.

To violate a truce was indeed, in the Romans’ eyes, a serious matter. But what about the earlier truce, in Book 11? After the carnage of Book 10, Aeneas meets Latin representatives, and they agree on a truce for the burial of the dead. Aeneas is in a statesmanlike and magnanimous mood: ‘You ask me for peace on behalf of the dead? I would willingly grant peace to the living, too …’. (11.110-11). A period of twelve days is agreed upon (bis senos pepigere dies, 11.133). But this interlude of peace ends when the Latins, while in the middle of a heated debate, receive news that Aeneas is on the move (11.446). The Latins appear to be taken by surprise. Yet, if Aeneas has abided by the terms of the truce he has agreed to, they should be ready for the renewal of hostilities. There are two possibilities: either all the Latins, from their leaders Latinus, Turnus and Drances down to the common people, have been unable to keep track of the passage of time, or else Aeneas and the Trojans have broken the truce and attacked prematurely.

On such a significant matter, one would expect commentators to express an opinion. But Gransden and Horsfall, for example, say nothing about it.Footnote ³ In section 2 I will argue that indications concerning the passage of time in Book 11, when interpreted in the light of an Iliadic precedent, suggest strongly that Aeneas does indeed break the truce. In section 3 I will argue that the Latins’ reaction to the news of the Trojans’ attack is consistent with this conclusion, and something that Diomedes says tends to support it.

Does this mean that Virgil depicts Aeneas as acting here in a fashion that is inconsistent with his famous pietas, or that undermines his status as the hero of the poem? These are large questions, going way beyond the one that this article sets out to answer. However, in section 4 I will suggest that questions such as these arise almost inevitably, given that Virgil was commissioned to write a poem celebrating Augustus while knowing far less than we do about Augustus’ long-term achievement. In section 5 I will suggest that Virgil deals with this problem by showing us much that he does not explicitly tell us, yet in such a way that what is merely shown can easily be missed, or deliberately ignored, by readers who are so inclined.

2. THE PASSAGE OF TIME IN AENEID 11

How many days do the events of Book 11 occupy? These events include both an agreement to observe a twelve-day truce and the hostilities that follow it. Therefore, if the truce is not violated, the narrative must cover a period of at least twelve or thirteen days.Footnote ⁴ Yet there are only two places in Book 11 where the transition from one day to the next is explicitly noted. These are at lines 182–3 (Aurora interea … almam | extulerat lucem, ‘Dawn meanwhile had lifted up its bountiful light’) and at line 210 (tertia lux gelidam caelo dimouerat umbram, ‘The third dawn had driven the chilly darkness from the sky’). This does not necessarily mean, I take it, that we are to regard the entire action of the book as taking place inside a period of seventy-two hours. We need to examine the Trojan and Latin activity after the first time-reference (as described in lines 183–209) and after the second (as described in lines 211–12), as well as the timing of the earlier activity described in lines 133–8: peaceful tree-felling and wood-gathering in preparation for funerals.

On the face of it, the phrase tertia lux may indeed seem to point to a 72-hour time span: one day on which the treaty is concluded, a second day on which funerals take place, and a third day on which the Latins deliberate and the Trojans again attack. But, if that were correct, the Trojans’ breach of the twelve-day truce would be so flagrant that the poet could hardly avoid commenting on it. Aeneas would be attacking ten days early! That surely cannot be what Virgil intends. The same problem arises with Gransden's suggestion that the entire action of the book takes place within four days.Footnote ⁵

A more promising approach suggests itself when one recollects that there is a Homeric precedent for a twelve-day funeral period, in Iliad 24.Footnote ⁶ Priam meets Achilles and points out to him that, in the absence of a truce, the Trojans do not feel safe collecting wood for Hector's funeral pyre. Therefore, he suggests an eleven-day respite from fighting (Il. 24.664-7): nine days for mourning and lamentation, a tenth day for burial and feasting, and an eleventh day for heaping up the mound over Hector's body, ‘but on the twelfth day we will go into battle, if it is necessary’.

The description of Hector's actual funeral at Il. 24.782-804 is broadly consistent with Priam's proposal. The Trojans spend nine days gathering wood, and on the tenth they set fire to the pyre with Hector's body on it. As regards the eleventh day, Homer goes into more detail: the Trojans douse any remaining flames, gather the bones and ashes of Hector into a chest, place the chest in a grave, and heap up a burial mound over it before returning for a feast in Priam's palace. But Homer adds an important detail in lines 799–800: ‘they heaped up the mound quickly and placed look-outs around on all sides, in case the Achaeans should attack early’. Just as Achilles could not entirely trust himself not to kill the suppliant Priam in a fit of anger (Il. 24.568-70), so (it seems) the Trojans could not entirely trust the Achaeans to hold themselves back from attacking them on the eleventh day rather than on the twelfth. Homer thus shows us that, in the mythical heroic age to which Aeneas too belonged, truces were precarious. Breaches of them were not unthinkable, even by commanders viewed favourably (on the whole) in the epic context, such as Homer's Agamemnon or Virgil's Aeneas.Footnote ⁷

The bis senos dies of Aen. 11.133 clearly recall the ‘twelfth day’ mentioned at Il. 24.667. In the light of this, it is plausible to assume that the truce proper between the Trojans and the Latins was meant to last eleven days, not twelve. Of these eleven days, the elaborate preparatory tree-felling, trunk-splitting, chopping and carting described in 11.133-8 could well occupy the first nine. The stage is now set for a closer examination of tertia lux in 11.210.

One is at first tempted to think that the tertia lux must be the third dawn after those nine days of preparation, in other words the dawn of the twelfth day—precisely the day on which, in Iliad 24, the resumption of battle is permitted. If so, for Aeneas and his Trojans to attack the Latins on that day clearly involves no breach of the truce. But two considerations cast doubt on this interpretation. The first involves the activities described in lines 183–210 and 211–12. The second involves Roman approaches to time-reckoning.

Lines 183–210 describe at length what both the Trojans and the Latins are doing on the day before the tertia lux dawns. If the tertia lux is the twelfth day, and if the truce period in Aeneid 11 is meant to parallel that of Iliad 24, then this Trojan and Latin activity should correspond to what happens on the eleventh day of the truce in the Iliad: that is, the gathering together and burial of ashes and bones, after the cremation on the tenth day. But that is not what we find in lines 183–210. Instead, these lines describe the cremations and the ceremonial (or lack of it) associated with them: orderly and solemn on the Trojan side, confused and panicky on the Latin side. In terms of the Iliadic precedent, this is activity appropriate to the tenth day, not the eleventh.

Lines 211–12 are equally puzzling, at first sight. If the tertia lux is the twelfth day, then we would expect these lines to describe preparations for battle, after the end of the agreed truce. Instead, what we read is: maerentes altum cinerem et confusa ruebant | ossa focis tepidoque onerabant aggere terrae, ‘[the Latins] were sadly levelling flat the high piles of ash and the bones jumbled up on the bonfire sites, and piling on top of them a warm heap of earth’. Thus, what the Latins are doing is precisely what, according to Homer, the Trojans were doing on the eleventh day of the truce for Hector's funeral: gathering his ashes and bones and burying them under a mound of earth (Il. 24.788-801). Yet this day is the same as the one on which the Latins’ assembly breaks up in confusion on news of Aeneas’ attack. It thus appears that the Trojans in the Aeneid do what the Trojans at the end of Iliad 24 feared that the Achaeans might do: they attack prematurely.

Yet, if the Trojans are attacking a day early, how do we explain the expression tertia lux? To us, it may seem obvious that ‘the third day’ after nine days of preparation should be not the eleventh but the twelfth day. The Romans, however, in reckoning periods of time, were accustomed to count also the day after (or, as appropriate, the day before) the period being measured. That is why nudius tertius means not ‘three days ago’ but ‘two days ago’, or ‘the day before yesterday’. It is also why the date ante diem tertium Idus Martias (for example) designates not the third day before the Ides of March but the second day before, that is, the 13th of March (the Ides being the 15th).Footnote ⁸ So, in this instance, the implied ‘first day’, in Virgil's reckoning, may well be the last day of the nine-day preparation period. It follows that the implied ‘second day’ (the day ushered in by lines 182–3) should be the tenth day of the truce period. This is indeed when, as appropriate for the tenth day, both sides conduct their cremation ceremonies, as described in mournful detail in lines 184–209. So the ‘third day’ (tertia lux) is equivalent to Homer's eleventh day, the last day of the truce, not the twelfth day, on which fighting is expected to resume. Hence it is no surprise to find that, on that day, the Latins are burying the ashes (lines 211–12).

According to this analysis, the action of Book 11 includes a nine-day wood-gathering period, the description of which is condensed into six lines (lines 133–8), without any mention of sunsets or sunrises. This suggests a slightly different slant on the phrase tertia lux. When seen from the viewpoint of the busy tenth and eleventh days, full of concentrated yet clearly differentiated activity (cremation on the tenth day, burial on the eleventh), the first nine days, devoted to the undifferentiated task of wood-gathering, blur into one. This will be especially so, if the wood-gathering continues all night as well as all day, at least on the Latin side. Virgil hints at this in line 138 (nec … cessant, ‘and they do not cease’), and it is consistent with the picture painted at lines 203–9. Unlike the Trojans, who conduct solemn cremation ceremonies on the shore (184–202), the Latins are overwhelmed by the sheer number of their dead. Many bodies (it appears) are even buried without cremation (corpora partim … infodiunt, 204-5), while others are burnt uncounted and without honour (nec numero nec honore cremant, 208). On this basis, the ‘first day’, in terms of tertia lux, may in Virgil's mind be not the ninth day specifically but rather all the first nine hectic days of the truce period. These analyses, however, represent not incompatible alternatives so much as different perspectives on the truce: one temporal, the other psychological.

So, on the basis of close examination of the text, in the light of Iliad 24, an answer to our question emerges. It seems overwhelmingly likely that Aeneas does break the truce in Book 11. He does what the Trojans feared that the Achaeans might do at the end of the Iliad: he attacks one day early.

3. DIOMEDES’ WARNING AND THE LATINS’ REACTION TO THE TROJAN ATTACK

On hearing news of the attack, the Latins appear to be taken by surprise and react angrily (extemplo turbati animi concussaque uulgi | pectora et arrectae stimulis haud mollibus irae, 11.451-2). At first sight, these words seem to support the view that Aeneas is attacking one day early. On closer examination, this support is not so strong as may at first appear; the Latins’ reaction is consistent with truce-violation on Aeneas’ part, but not conclusive. Rather than anyone on the Latin side, it is Diomedes (surprisingly enough) who hints that Aeneas may be not altogether trustworthy.

It is necessary to distinguish between the Latin leaders and the ordinary people (uulgus). The uulgus react in anger and confusion when they hear of the Trojan approach. Yet the same phrase extemplo turbati animi is used also at 8.4, when there is no question of a truce being violated: it is merely that serious hostilities are at last getting under way after the skirmishes over Silvia's pet stag. Ordinary people are easily upset, it seems. So perhaps we should attach more weight to the reaction of the Latin leaders (Latinus, Turnus and Drances). Does any of these say or do anything that implies a truce violation?

The answer is no—but for reasons that are explainable independently. Old Latinus, almost in despair, has reverted to supporting peace with the Trojans. For him at this point to denounce a truce breach on Aeneas’ part would merely draw attention to the collapse of his hopes. As for Drances, the most fervent Latin partisan of Aeneas’ cause, his only possible reaction in the face of an attack a day early is embarrassed silence. In any case, both are swept aside in the hubbub. It is Turnus’ voice that is heard, as he resumes the role of military commander of all the anti-Trojan forces.

What of Turnus, then? It is entirely in character that, as soon as battle looms, he should be eager for it, whatever the circumstances. His only thought now is of how to dispose his troops (463–7). One can even envisage him being secretly grateful for a premature attack, so that the need to justify his conduct in front of civilians is cut short. Therefore, even if there has been a truce violation, we should not expect Turnus to tell us.

Ironically, the only leader whose words hint at a truce violation in Book 11 is Diomedes. Venulus has just reported Diomedes’ refusal to ally himself with Latinus against Aeneas. ‘Conclude a treaty with Aeneas, if you have an opportunity,’ he says (11.292-3), ‘but beware of joining in battle with weapons (ast armis concurrant arma cauete)’. Yet why, after a treaty has been concluded, should any possibility of battle arise? Two possible paraphrases for these lines suggest themselves: either (a) ‘Do not go to war against him, and furthermore make a treaty with him if you can’, or (b) ‘Make a treaty with him, but even so beware of the possibility of war’. If Aeneas is trustworthy, (a) makes more sense. On the other hand, the order of the clauses and the use of the conjunction ast ‘but’ point towards (b), with a surprising implication: in the opinion of Diomedes, Aeneas, notwithstanding his pietas, is someone to be wary of, even if one has a treaty with him. Or perhaps the implication is more general: all truces are precarious, as the experience of Book 12 suggests.

The upshot is that, even if no one explicitly denounces the Trojans for violating the truce in Book 11, there are good reasons for this. The omission therefore does not count against the argument presented in section 2.

4. IMPLICATIONS: THE AENEID WITHOUT AUGUSTUS

The suggestion that Aeneas does something so un-Roman as to violate a truce may seem shocking. Yet the text of Book 11 supports this conclusion. What are we to make of it?

One's first inclination may be to relate the discovery directly to the well-known controversy between ‘pessimistic’ and ‘optimistic’ interpretations of the Aeneid, as evidence in support of a ‘pessimistic’ view.Footnote ⁹ But I would rather take a step back and look at the implications in the light of a fact that is glaringly obvious, yet seldom brought to bear on evaluation of the Aeneid.

Virgil, at the time he was writing the poem, had no way of knowing what we know: that Augustus would, in the long term, be so successful in his political aims as to change the course of European political history more fundamentally than perhaps anyone else in the last three thousand years. All that Virgil knew was that, for a century or more, Italy had suffered social strife and intermittent civil war, during which a succession of strong men (such as Marius, Sulla, Pompey, Caesar) had tried to impose order but ultimately failed. By the late twenties b.c.e., things were looking up: after the victory at Actium, there was no longer any obvious challenger to the former Caius Octavius, now called Augustus. But that did not mean that his position was totally secure. Something happened in 23 b.c.e. that required Augustus to adjust his political arrangements yet again. And, quite apart from risks posed by jealous senators or ambitious generals, Augustus’ health was not robust. So the cautious Virgil had no reason to think that he would, in the long run, succeed where others had failed.

Virgil was no doubt deeply grateful that Augustus had, for the time being, restored peace to Italy. He would also have been grateful that some family land near Mantua had (it would seem) been saved from confiscation. So, when Augustus encouraged Virgil to write an epic poem in celebration of his achievements, gratitude would have been a strong motivation to accept the challenge. At the same time, as Virgil worked on the Aeneid, he must soon have come to realize that what was taking shape would be the greatest poem ever written in Latin. Significantly, when Anchises tells Aeneas that ‘others’ (that is, the Greeks) will produce better sculptors, orators and philosophers, he does not say that they will also produce better poets (6.847-50). Virgil was therefore faced with a dilemma. If (as seemed most likely) Augustus’ political project failed, so that he came to be ridiculed, reviled or simply forgotten by later generations, what would happen to the great poem that Virgil knew he was composing?

To ensure the continuing recognition that he knew it deserved, Virgil had to include in it a second message, a non-political or (more specifically) a non-Augustan one, that would continue to attract readers even if the overtly pro-Augustan passages in Books 1, 6 and 8 came to be seen as an embarrassment. But an accident of history (namely, Augustus’ unforeseeable success) has meant that those pro-Augustan passages have never been seen as an embarrassment. Consequently, the non-political message has gone largely unnoticed, or is noticed only as a kind of appendage to the Augustan one: acknowledgement that great national achievements can impose a cost, sometimes a fatal cost, on individuals.

Proper appreciation of the Aeneid as a literary work, rather than as a social or historical document, requires us to cease viewing it through the lens of Augustus’ historical legacy. But it still has the traditional format of an epic, with Aeneas as its hero. We must therefore find adequate reasons to admire Aeneas, quite apart from his role as a predecessor of Augustus. If we find in the end that we cannot admire him, then the poem must be classed as a failure. So, in the present context, the question arises: how can we continue to admire Aeneas, even though he violates a truce?

Questions of this nature, even if not precisely this question, are familiar. For example, how can we continue to admire Aeneas when he sends four sons of Sulmo and four sons of Ufens to be sacrificed on the funeral pyre of Pallas (10.517-20, 11.81-2)—an act of a kind that even in the Iliad is characterized as wicked (23.176)? Also, given that Apollo is the patron deity of Augustus, is it not disquieting that Aeneas has no compunction in killing a man (Haemonides) clearly identified by his garb as a priest of Apollo (10.537-41)—indeed, not merely killing but ‘sacrificing’ him (immolat, 10.541)? And, given that Aeneas’ mission is ordained by Jupiter, what about the fact that Aeneas, during his battlefield aristeia, is compared to the hundred-handed giant Aegaeon fighting against Jupiter (10.566-70)? What does this imply for Aeneas’ famous pietas, which should surely encompass obedience to Jupiter's will?

Mention of Jupiter suggests what may at first look like a strong objection to the idea of a deliberate second message, a message that has nothing to do with Augustus. ‘For Virgil to take out insurance (so to speak) against the possibility (or even, from his point of view, the likelihood) of Augustus’ failure’, the objection runs, ‘requires him to present Jupiter as untrustworthy. This is because Jupiter has assured Venus at 1.286–8 that “Julius Caesar”, meaning Augustus, will triumph. Virgil must also present Aeneas’ father Anchises as an unreliable prophet, because at 6.791-805 Anchises too promises Augustus’ success, in the context of the parade of heroes in the underworld. But this makes Aeneas himself, with his pietas towards Jupiter and Anchises, into a somewhat pathetic figure: a dupe rather than a hero. And, since, as you have acknowledged, the poem cannot succeed unless Aeneas is indeed a hero (someone that we can in the end admire, whatever he may have done), your suggestion of a second non-political message is incompatible with the poem's undoubted success: its recognition as a great work for over two thousand years.’

To answer this objection, one must show (a) that Anchises is indeed unreliable, (b) that Jupiter is indeed untrustworthy and (c) that Aeneas’ pietas is not limited to obedience to Anchises and Jupiter. This task turns out to be easier than one might think, but it is too large to complete here. For now, I will limit myself to saying a little about (c), (a) and (b), in that order.

Pietas towards the gods and one's ancestors is one kind of pietas, but not the only kind. There is also inverse pietas: the kind that gods display towards dutiful worshippers and parents towards dutiful children. An example is the pietas that the evil Mezentius displays towards his son Lausus. This goes beyond mere convention, however, and arouses the reader's sympathy for the old warrior in his final duel with Aeneas (10.833-908). And, crucially, one can also be pius towards friends and lovers: people to whom one is committed not by social convention but by choice.Footnote ¹⁰ The chief example in the poem involves the two people who receive more extravagant praise than anyone else: Nisus and Euryalus (fortunati ambo …, 9.446-9). They are a selfish and reckless pair, yet they deserve to be remembered, because Nisus maintains to the end his pius amor for Euryalus (his outstanding characteristic: 5.296), while Euryalus reciprocates Nisus’ love (9.182, 9.430).

Does Aeneas display this kind of pietas, chosen rather than imposed? Yes: towards Pallas, the son of his ally, Evander. The poet makes it clear that the sight of Pallas’ baldric on Turnus is the paramount reason why Aeneas kills Turnus. This is just as was predicted at 10.501-5: ‘There will come a time when Turnus will rue taking those spoils’. Arguably, Aeneas also displays belated pietas towards Dido, inasmuch as he clothes the dead Pallas in a tunic made by Dido (11.72-7).Footnote ¹¹ In view of the scolding Aeneas received from Jupiter's messenger, Mercury, while he himself was wearing a garment made by Dido in Carthage (4.262-4), this homage to Pallas is also a snub to Jupiter—not a deliberate snub on Aeneas’ part, necessarily, but an indication of the attitude to Jupiter that (as we shall see) Virgil's non-political message encourages.

Anchises is displayed three times as a source of bad advice. First, he almost induces Aeneas to disobey Venus and remain in Troy, to die hopelessly (2.634–70). Secondly, he interprets the advice of Apollo at Delphi as advice to settle in Crete (3.103–17). Thirdly, when this turns out to be a mistake, he urges a return to Delphi to consult the oracle again (3.143-6). Only when the Penates of Troy appear to Aeneas and command him to sail to Italy (3.154-71) does Anchises accept Italy as the proper destination. So Anchises’ underworld prediction of the return of a Saturnian Golden Age under Augustus (6.791-4) need not be regarded as reliable either. It is notable that Aeneas fails to respond to Anchises during the entire catalogue of heroes, despite encouragement to do so (et dubitamus adhuc …?, 6.806-7)Footnote ¹² , until at the end he sees Augustus’ nephew Marcellus. Even more strikingly, throughout the rest of the poem Aeneas behaves as if the underworld visit had never taken place. But this is just as well if, as the poet hints, it is all a deceptive dream (6.893-9).

As evidence for the unreliability of Jupiter, one need only compare what he says about the Trojans’ future to Venus (1.257-96), to Cybele (9.94-103), to the assembled gods (10.6-15) and to Juno (12.830-40). If Venus were to overhear Jupiter telling Cybele that he had never guaranteed Aeneas’ safe arrival in Italy, it would come as a rude shock to her.Footnote ¹³ As for Jupiter's assertion in Book 10 that he has forbidden the Italians to oppose the Trojans, one has to suppose either that he never forbade it and is now being either forgetful or deceitful, or that he did indeed forbid it but his order was ineffectual. Quite apart from this, Jupiter fails now totally in his effort to establish harmony between Venus and Juno.Footnote ¹⁴ (We already know that Jupiter sometimes issues ineffectual commands. Through Mercury he instructs the Carthaginians not to molest the shipwrecked Trojans, but is apparently disobeyed: 1.297-304, 1.525-6, 1.562-4.) And Venus would be equally surprised to overhear Jupiter assuring Juno in Book 12 that ‘Troy’ will disappear, inasmuch as the Trojans will be submerged among the Italians, losing their language, culture and identity.Footnote ¹⁵ Aeneas, by contrast, envisages until the very end that the Latins and the Trojans will live separately, side by side, with equal rights (12.187-94). This vision is consistent with what he told his comrades in Book 1: ‘There it is fated (fas) that the realms of Troy will rise again’ (1.206). It is just as well that he, too, does not overhear Jupiter's capitulation to Juno.Footnote ¹⁶

5. CONCLUSION: WHAT WE ARE TOLD AND WHAT WE ARE SHOWN

A straightforward question about Book 11 (‘Is the truce complied with?’) turns out to be answerable, and in a manner not flattering to Aeneas. But Virgil does not tell us the answer; rather, he shows us how to find it, by presenting us with a truce format drawn from Iliad 24 and allowing us to deduce that Aeneas’ Trojans, unlike the Iliad's Achaeans, attack a day early. This distinction between showing and telling is, I believe, central to explaining why what I have called the non-political message of the Aeneid has been so effectively obscured by the seductive historical lens through which we typically view the poem, namely the lens of Augustus’ success.

As I have already mentioned, Virgil does not tell us directly that Aeneas behaves reprehensibly in planning a human sacrifice; instead, he shows us it, by way of Homer's comment on Achilles’ parallel sacrifice in Il. 23.176. Likewise, Virgil does not tell us that Jupiter is unreliable. Rather, he shows us this, inasmuch as (for example) Jupiter swears an oath by the Styx that he will not interfere in the fighting between Trojans and Italians (10.104-15), and then proceeds to break this oath by encouraging Mezentius into the fray (10.689). But he does this more than 500 lines later, far enough away for the anomaly not to be noticed by those readers who have ears only for the Augustan message, not the non-political one.Footnote ¹⁷

This indirect method by which the second message is communicated affects the truce issue in Book 11 too, I suggest. In the course of the 313 lines between the agreement of the truce at 11.133 and Aeneas’ resumption of warfare at 11.446 we are told of cremations and burials, as we would expect. But we are told also of two extraneous matters. The arrival of Pallas’ body at Evander's court occupies 42 lines (11.139-81), curiously separated from Aeneas’ farewell to the body at line 99. Then the Latins’ assembly (Venulus’ report on the embassy to Diomedes and the debate between Latinus, Drances and Turnus) occupies 220 lines (11.225-445). Thus, of the 313 lines between the truce agreement and the news of the Trojan advance, the great majority (262 lines) deals with matters unrelated to the truce and its purpose. So, especially since (for reasons explained in section 3) no leader on the Latin side complains about the truce violation, it is easy for the reader to fail to notice that any truce violation has occurred. Virgil does not merely fail to tell us explicitly what has happened; he seems deliberately to make it easy for us to overlook it.

Why would Virgil do this? The answer, I suggest, is now clear. Virgil knew how great a poem he was writing, one that would deserve to be remembered for generations even if Augustus should become a mere footnote in history.Footnote ¹⁸ But he was also grateful to Augustus for peace and stability in Italy, and no doubt also for more tangible rewards (an estate to live on near Naples, for example). It is entirely understandable that he should be wary of incurring Augustus’ displeasure. Therefore, so long as Augustus was alive and in power, Virgil wished the poem's Augustan message to predominate. Unfortunately, Augustus’ success has encouraged this message to predominate far beyond Augustus’ lifetime.