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ClCv241

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Ovid Met.

Frederico Barocci, “The Flight of Aeneas from Troy,” 1598

Aeneas carrying Anchises, Ascanius and Creusa fleeing burning Troy, in a dramatic classical painting

Aeneas is evacuating his family from falling Troy. His father Anchises is carrying the Penates as Aeneas carries him, while Creusa follows a little way off. She needs to stick with the group…

Little Ascanius, perhaps hearing how “the vaulted halls ring with women’s wails; the din strikes the golden stars (Aen. 2.487)”, covers his ears. Aeneas’ shield and spear lie abandoned in the foreground; this is not his fight anymore.

Details from Barocci’s contemporary Rome — Bramante’s Tempietto and the ancient Marcus Aurelius Column — are used as backdrops on what is supposed to be burning Troy.

OGCMA slides are designed by Roger T. Macfarlane for use in Classical Civilization 241 courses at Brigham Young University.
The present resource contains information assembled forThe Oxford Guide to Classical Mythology in the Arts, 1400 - 1990's, edited by J. Davidson Reid (Oxford 1994), and it is used with express permission from Oxford University Press.
Address concerns or inquiries to macfarlane@byu.edu.