This passage from Virgil's Aeneid comes from Aeneas' tale of Dido, as the Trojan leader describes his city and his comrades on the night that Sinon liberated the Greeks of the Trojan horse and opened the door to the Greek armies on the beach. Aeneas failed to observe much of the scene he describes and avoids details he could not have known to gain help from the Carthaginians and captivate his audience, generating sympathy for the doomed Trojans. The passage contrasts the Trojans' ignorance and trust in the gods with imminent, unrevealed danger and the cruelty of fate, helping the Greeks in every way possible. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”? Get an original essayThe first event of the passage is the Trojans' celebration of the horse. Otherwise, a captured Greek told them that the creature was a gift from the Greeks, an offering to appease Pallas Athena. He also tells them that the Greeks have returned home, where, for some reason, they can pray better to Athena. The Trojans, good servants of the gods, roll the device into the temple of Minerva and adorn the "delubra" with "festa...sling", symbols of life which offer an ironic contrast with the burden of death and impiety of the Horse. The first instance of "delubra" in the Aeneid occurs just before this passage, in II.225-6, when "delubra ad summa dracones/effugiunt" to kill the family of Laocon, who urged the Trojans not to not accept the horse. The repetition of the word gives the passage a sinister tone, emphasizing the hostility of the gods toward Troy. This feeling of danger is developed by Aeneas when he mentions “miseri, quibus ultimus esset/He dies”. The initial, unnecessary inclusion of "our" draws attention to Aeneas's views and sympathies (not that they have not been well established elsewhere) as he recounts his own experience as a than one of these faithful. The slightly shifted location of "ille dies", after the verb and at the beginning of the verse, as well as the use of "ille", underline that this very day of celebration would be the end for the Trojans. They let the Horse enter their city out of piety, and they were defeated by the Greeks on a day of worship. The tone of this passage changes abruptly in the following lines, shifting our gaze from the city of Troy to the nightfall over the entire city. world. The scene is literally “vertitur” for the Greeks, while “interea”, like the “ille mort” before it, underlines the simultaneity of the event with the Trojan rejoicing. The phrase “caelum et ruit oceano nox” indicates larger scale events, as does the size of the “magna” shadows. The night is indifferent to the Trojans and, on the contrary, useful to the Greeks. The “caelum,” a word often used to refer to the abode of the gods, does nothing to help Troy; the “nox”, placed insistently at the end of a verse, “ruits” inexorably. (although, for the sake of fairness, the phrase "nox ruit" is often used by Vergil) The harsh "t", "c" and "x" sounds throughout the line ("vertitur interea caelum et ruit oceano nox") underline a harshness and threat still unrelated to any sign of danger. The next line, “implicate umbra magna terramque polumque,” ​​continues the foreboding with a series of dark spondees, whose leisurely rhythm reflects a quiet, almost relaxed night, contrasting with the hidden dangers. Its “m” consonants rumble dangerously and contribute to the integrity of the verse. Pairs of words with the same endings and numbers of syllables, as well as the equivalent syntactic function, "umbra magna" and "terramque polumque", follow one another; the consonance sounds in almost every word, and the content is natural, almostpastoral; the line has a beauty entirely separate from its context. But we, like the Trojans, are shaken from this calm meditation at the beginning of the next verse, with the end of the little tricolon crescendo, "terramque polumque/Myrmidonumque dolos", moving. brings us back from the cosmic scale to the battlefields, to ending with the polysyllabic “Myrmidonumque” whose length, placement and scale surprise the reader. The darkness, in all its beauty, is a help to the Greeks, who make their first appearance in this passage under the cover of night. After this shock, the lines focus again on Troy, where the Trojans find themselves "fused", still unconscious. and calm, throughout the protection of the “moenia”, which, open to the Horse, will not do much good to the Trojans. The interior of the city is silent and momentarily safe; everyone “keeps going”. They are defenseless; "sopor fessos complecitur artus." The next line moves to the Greeks outside the walls, who, unlike the sleeping Trojans, work diligently at war, sailing the fleet from Tenedos. “And iam” once again underlines the simultaneity of the rest of the Trojans and the attack of the “phalanx of Argiva”, two Greek words threatening Troy. The assonance of “iam Argiva phalanx”, “instructis navibus ibat” and the alliteration “Tenedo tacitae”, like the favor of the gods, seem sadly granted to the Greek warriors, but everything works out for them; they sail in beauty, like the night. The chiasmic “tacitae per amica quietia lunae” shows the “amica” towards the Greeks of nature itself. The use of "tacitae" and "silentia" emphasizes calm, which probably refers to the Greek fleet rather than night in general; Although Virgil leaves no doubt that the night is quiet, there is no reason why this would help the Greeks, as the lack of additional noise would make it easier for the Trojans to hear their approach. “Tacitae” is almost a transferred epithet. The moon is calm, but calm moons are hardly remarkable; it is his light, not his silence, that would help the fleet. The placement of the adjective makes the silent Greeks almost part of their environment. Indeed, the Greeks are at home on the beach. They seek the shore, "nota," not only because they know where it is, but because they have camped there so long that it has become familiar to them. War and convenience collide, as they still do with the “flammas” seen from the city. The word portends for the Trojans the danger of a burning city, but for the Greeks it is only a useful signal. Otherwise, who deceived the Trojans by telling how he escaped human sacrifice, works "furtim" in the darkness, "fatisque deum defensus iniquis." The Greeks, often impious, favored by Minerva, defeat the inhabitants of Troy by exploiting the good nature of the Trojans and their desperation to win the favors of the goddess. The gods are on the side of Greece, not Troy, and the fates are not fair. As Anchises observes in III.540-3, horses can be a sign of good or evil; the horse itself is a symbol of Neptune, once the beneficent patron god of Troy, who is tearing down the city walls. Of course, the Greeks deserve some of the credit for the destruction of Troy. The description once passes from the entire Greek fleet, "instructis navibus", to the "tacitae... lunae"; from there, the scale focuses on a particular "regia puppis", expands to encompass the "fatisque deum", then contracts to Otherwise. His betrayal of the Trojan hospitality is underlined by the insertion of his name at the very end of this long sentence, in a surge of suspense and shock. With his name begins a long. 1998.