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Notes Display Latin text | translated by Theodore C. Williams Book VIII Chapter 17: The weapons are forged | Next chapter Return to index Previous chapter |
Night's course half run, soon as the first repose had banished sleep, -- what time some careful wife whose distaff and Minerva's humble toil must earn her bread, rekindling her warm hearth, adds a night-burden to her laboring day, and by the torch-light cheers her maidens on to their long tasks; that so her husband's bed she may in honor keep, and train to power her dear men- children -- at such prime of morn, with not less eager mind the Lord of Fire fled his soft couch and to his forges tried. An island near Aeolian Lipara not far from a Sicilian headland lies, where smoking rocks precipitously tower above a vast vault, which the Cyclops' skill outhollowed large as Aetna's thunderous caves. There ring the smitten anvils, and the roof re-echoes, roaring loud. Chalybian ores hiss in the gloom, and from the furnace mouths puff the hot-panting fires. T is Vulcan's seat, and all that island is Vulcania. Thither descended now the god of fire from height of heaven. Events: The Gods interfere in the Aeneid, Venus asks Vulcan weapons for Aeneas |
407-423 Inde ubi prima quies medio iam noctis abactae curriculo expulerat somnum, cum femina primum, cui tolerare colo uitam tenuique Minerua impositum, cinerem et sopitos suscitat ignis noctem addens operi, famulasque ad lumina longo exercet penso, castum ut seruare cubile coniugis et possit paruos educere natos: haud secus ignipotens nec tempore segnior illo mollibus e stratis opera ad fabrilia surgit. insula Sicanium iuxta latus Aeoliamque erigitur Liparen fumantibus ardua saxis, quam subter specus et Cyclopum exesa caminis antra Aetnaea tonant, ualidique incudibus ictus auditi referunt gemitus, striduntque cauernis stricturae Chalybum et fornacibus ignis anhelat, Volcani domus et Volcania nomine tellus. hoc tunc ignipotens caelo descendit ab alto. |