Influence of Homer in the Aeneid
Homer and His Guide, by William-Adolphe Bouguereau (1825–1905)
The topic of the Aeneid is the flight from Troy and the adventures of Aeneas to get to Lazio, where they have to overcome to different enemies to establish the new Troy, as the gods wanted. The poem is divided into twelve books and, according its topic, has two different parts.
⇒ Books I-VI: in this first part recounts the tortuous journey of Aeneas from Troy to Italy.
Inspired in the journey of Odysseus narrated in the Odyssey.
⇒ Books VII-XII: in the second half is about the wars leaded by Aeneas in Italian. Inspired in the Iliad.
The escape of Troy (1507-1510). In this cool Palazzo del Magnifico, Siena, painted by Girolamo Genga and preserved in the National Gallery, we can see how Aeneas carries Anchises, his father; son, Ascanio, is also with them. The woman who runs the wife, Creusa. In the background the Trojan horse can be seen.
In the development of the Aeneid we can see the confluence of several elements, including the Homeric epics. Some features of Homeric epic used in the Aeneid are the following.: ⇒ The Homeric verse:
the dactylic hexameter
⇒ Diction formulate ⇒ The Homeric language ⇒ Development
in a legendary past
⇒ The omniscient narrator
The differences between the Roman epic and the Greek epic are the following: ⇒ The effort to conquer ⇒ The need to commemorate ⇒ They don´t have got oral nature ⇒ The patriotism
Regarding the content, the Aeneid has the following parallels to the Iliad: ⇒ A woman as a cause of war: Lavinia in the case of the Aeneid and Helena in the case of the Iliad. ⇒ Catalogue of people in struggle. ⇒ In both poems die a young friend of the protagonist, Pallas in the Aeneid and
Patroclus in the Iliad. ⇒ In both poems we can find the two final duel between the champions of the two sides: the duel between Aeneas and Turn in the case of the Aeneid and in the case of the Iliad the meeting face to face between Achilles and Hector.