Essay by on the Aeneid

Abasiama Essien
      Book II Essay

      The second book of “the Aeneid” begins with Aeneas relating to Dido his personal narrative of the concurrent fall of Troy and the King of Troy Priam. It was more than evident to the Roman reader and even the reader today that Troy was a beautifully majestic city and that Priam, as Troy’s monarch, was an equally majestic and laudable figure. The figuratively high pedestals that both Troy and Priam respectively were placed on allow each to be able to experience that precipitous fall from grace that ever characterizes a tragic hero. Thus, both Troy and Priam could reasonably be considered tragic heroes of Book II of “the Aeneid.” However, there is one tragic hero that experiences the defilement that characterizes a tragic hero. There is once tragic hero that perseveres through unjustifiable circumstances yet finally succumbs to the injustice of the world as is the fate of most tragic heroes.
      Troy, as previously stated, was a beautiful city to which praise and adornment flowed to, and in ironic fashion, continues to flow to even after its fall. The fall of Troy has led to an even greater adornment of the city and the people of the city than could have ever been achieved else wise. The fall, however, did not match this same effect for Troy’s prime citizen Priam. There is no other body that felt the wrath of the might hand of destruction mercilessly beating bad fortune onto Troy more than Priam. The devastation that Priam faced can be described in lines 529 to 539 of “the Aeneid, “Illum ardens infesto vulnere Phyrrus insequitur, jam jamque manu tenet et permit hasta. Ut tandem ante oculous evasit et ora parentum, concidit, ac multo vitam cum sanguine fuidit. Hic Priamus, quamquam in media jam morte tenetur, non tamen abstinuit nec voci iraeque pepercit. ‘At tibi pro scelere,’ exclamat, ‘pro talibus ausis di, si qua est caelo pietas quae talia curet, persolvant gratis dignas, et paremia reddant debita, qui nati coram me... [continues]

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