What It Is
Aeneas's Shield is the central piece of the armor that Vulcan forges at the request of Venus for her son, in Book VIII, when the war in Latium draws near. It is an enormous shield, of seven circles upon circles, designed as a defense against all the Latin darts, and on it the god engraved the future history of Rome, from Romulus to the battle of Actium and the triumph of Augustus. It is the poem looking ahead within itself, and the only object that shows Aeneas what he does not know.
Where It Appears
In Book II, the hero's shield matters for the first time because it belongs to another. On the night Troy falls, Aeneas and his companions put on the arms of the dead Greeks to pass as enemies, and end up struck by their own Trojans, who take them for Greeks. It is the opposite of the shield of Book VIII: an emblem that lies about who carries it.
In Book VIII, Venus, frightened by the Latins, asks her husband Vulcan for arms. He yields and orders the Cyclopes to set aside Jupiter's thunderbolt, nearly finished:
Ingentem clypeum informant, unum omnia contra / Tela Latinorum, septenosque orbibus orbes / Impediunt, they shape a huge shield, one shield against all the darts of the Latins, and they interlace seven circles upon circles.
Hours earlier, Evander had shown him future Rome in brush and stone, and the shield will show the same city at another time. Near Caere, Venus leaves the arms under an oak, and Aeneas admires the helmet, the sword, the cuirass, and the shield. The poet says what the craftsman knew:
Illic res Italas Romanorumque triumphos, / Haud vatum ignarus, venturique inscius aevi, / Fecerat Ignipotens; illic genus omne futurae / Stirpis ab Ascanio, pugnataque in ordine bella, there the Lord of fire, who was no stranger to the seers and not ignorant of the age to come, had made the deeds of Italy and the triumphs of the Romans; there, the whole line of the future stock from Ascanius, and the wars fought in order.
The first scene engraved is the origin of Rome:
Fecerat et viridi fetam Mavortis in antro / Procubuisse lupam; geminos huic ubera circum / Ludere pendentes pueros et lambere matrem / Impavidos; illam tereti cervice reflexam / Mulcere alternos et corpora fingere lingua, he had also made the she-wolf, who had borne young to Mars, lying in a green cave; around her the two boys play, hanging from her teats and licking their mother fearlessly; she, bending her smooth neck back, caresses them alternately and shapes their bodies with her tongue.
In the Tartarus of the shield is Catiline, and apart, the righteous, to whom Cato gives laws:
Tartareas etiam sedes, alta ostia Ditis, / Et scelerum poenas; et te, Catilina, minaci / Pendentem scopulo Furiarumque ora trementem; / Secretosque pios, his dantem jura Catonem, he also added the abodes of Tartarus, the high gates of Dis, and the punishments of crimes; and you, Catiline, hanging from a threatening crag, trembling before the faces of the Furies; and apart, the pious, to whom Cato gives laws.
At the center is the battle of Actium, with Augustus on the stern:
Hinc Augustus agens Italos in praelia Caesar, / Cum patribus populoque, Penatibus et magnis diis, / Stans celsa in puppi; geminas cui tempora flammas / Laeta vomunt, patriumque aperitur vertice sidus, on one side Augustus Caesar, leading the Italians into battle, with the senators and the people, the Penates and the great gods, standing high on the stern; joyful flames pour from his twin temples, and the paternal star opens above his head.
And the book closes with Aeneas before the image he cannot read:
Talia per clypeum Vulcani, dona parentis, / Miratur, rerumque ignarus, imagine gaudet, / Attollens humero famamque et fata nepotum, such things, through the shield of Vulcan, a gift from his mother, he admires, and, not knowing the things, he rejoices in the image, raising to his shoulder the fame and the destinies of his descendants.
In Book X, at dawn, after the nymphs who had been ships warn him of the siege of the camp, Aeneas raises the shield in flames, which heartens the besieged and unsettles the Rutulians. In Book XI, Diomedes, in the reply that Venulus brings to the Latin council, advises giving the gifts to Aeneas, because he has already faced his shield and spear, and Turnus, accused of cowardice by Drances, accepts the duel, saying he will go against him even if he wears arms made by Vulcan:
Ibo animis contra; vel magnum praestet Achillem, / Factaque Vulcani manibus paria induat arma / Ille licet. [...] Solum Aeneas vocat? et vocet, oro., I will go against him with courage; even if he shows himself a great Achilles and puts on equal arms, made by the hands of Vulcan: let him wear them. [...] Does Aeneas alone summon me? Let him summon me, I pray.
In Book XII, Turnus's sword shatters against the arms made by Vulcan. In the hurry to climb onto the chariot, he had taken the sword of Metiscus rather than his father's, and the mortal blade served while the Trojans fled, and it broke like ice when it touched the god's armor.
What It Means
The most obvious reading is Augustan propaganda: the god engraves even the battle of Actium and the triumph of Caesar, and whoever hears the poem in Rome recognizes each scene. The objection is strong, because the shield decides no battle on its own, and Aeneas carries it without understanding. The poem does not choose between the two.
Aeneas's shield differs from Achilles's in the Iliad, which shows scenes of life and war without names. Aeneas's names people and events, from Romulus to Actium, written for whoever would recognize each scene, and the episode turns around the distance between what the image says and what the hero understands. When the Egyptian queen musters her troops at the center of the shield without seeing the serpents behind her, the scene shows in miniature this same distance, the one that will separate Aeneas from the armor he raises.
Aeneas's ignorance admits two readings: humble obedience, that of one who carries what was given to him, or solitude, because the only one who does not decipher what he carries is the one who carries it. The founder of the lineage carries without knowing what the lineage will be, and the poem leaves open whether this is humility or simply the limit of one who cannot see the future.
The shield gathers into one object what the poem separates elsewhere: material defense, designed against Latin darts, and history, which Aeneas only carries. The Penates he brought from Troy reappear engraved on Augustus's stern, and it is in this memory that the two ends of the poem, Troy's refuge and Rome's empire, touch on the shoulder of a man who does not see them touch.
Relationships
- Standard themes: War, Empire and Colonialism, Fate and Free Will.
- Characters: Aeneas, Venus, Turnus, Evander, Augustus.
- Nearby symbols: The Penates, which reappear on Augustus's stern, and Pallas's Belt, the other piece of armor that weighs on the final duel.