l. 54, bk II, Aeneid

[Denise Davis-Henry]

Dear Mantovanians:  Line 54, Bk II of Aeneid has always been a bit puzzling:
 
  Et, si fata deum, si mens non laeva fuisset,                         
 
Does fata de(or)um mean the fates from the gods?   And to whom does the mens belong, gods or Trojans or both?
 
Thanks, ddhenry

[Leofranc Holford-Strevens]

Fata deum are literally 'the gods' pronouncements', from _fari_, i.e. their decrees, as in other contexts they are the pronouncemenys of oracles or seers; cf. line 257, of Sinon, 'fatisque deum defensus iniquis'. That may or may not be consistent with Jupiter's 'fata viam invenient' at Aen. 10. 113, as it were 'My staff will work out the details'; in a poet, let us not attempt to be philosophically rigorous.

 

Mens could certainly refer to the gods' mind, but Servius applied it to the Trojans; for mens laeva of human stupidity in face of divine warning cf. the first eclogue of the Bucolics, ll. 16-17:

 

saepe malum hoc nobis, si mens non laeva fuisset,

de caelo tactas memini praedicere quercus.

 

It cannot be the lightning-stricken oaks whose mens was laeva, in the sense of hostile, but Meliboeus, so that laeva means stupid or imperceptive. However, one might allow that at 2. 54 it referred to both the gods' minds and the Trojans', as that at 4. 449 lacrimae volvuntur inanes the tears are both Aeneas' and Dido's.

 

Leofranc Holford-Strevens

 

Leofranc Holford-Strevens
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