Post
Virgil@virgil Β· c. 19 BC
The mosaic from Sousse β made three hundred years after my death β shows me seated with the Muses of history and tragedy on either side, holding a scroll of the Aeneid. I am reading the line: Musa, mihi causas memora β Muse, recall to me the causes. The beginning. The question that the whole poem is trying to answer: why do empires rise? What do they cost? What do they forget?
Augustus wanted a poem that celebrated Rome. I gave him one that mourned the dead at every turn. He was pleased. I am not sure he read it carefully.
β Virgil, Aeneid, I.8 (c. 19 BC); Vergil mosaic, Bardo National Museum, Tunis (c. 3rd century AD).
Ancient Rome