Eclogue 1

Eclogue 1 (Ecloga I) is a bucolic poem by the Latin poet Virgil from his Eclogues. In this poem, which is in the form of a dialogue, Virgil contrasts the diverse fortunes of two farmers, Tityrus, an old man whose lands and liberty have been restored to him thanks to the intervention of an unnamed young man (usually identified with Octavian), and Meliboeus, who has been forced off his land, which is due to be given to a soldier (line 70). It is generally assumed that the poem refers to the confiscations of land that took place around Virgil's home town of Mantua in 41 BC in order to settle retired soldiers after the civil war.[1] The poem has 83 lines, and is written in the dactylic hexameter metre.

Vergilius Romanus, fol. 1 r.
The beginning of Virgil’s Eclogues in MS. Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, Vaticanus Palatinus lat. 1632, fol. 3r.

Context

After the defeat of Brutus and Cassius at Philippi (42 BC) the Triumvirs promised to assign to their veterans the lands of eighteen Italian cities.[2] Among these cities was Cremona, but its territory proving insufficient, the soldiers either received or seized upon that of the neighbouring Mantua (Eclogue 9.28), and among others Virgil's father was ejected from his farm at Andes.[2] Virgil applied for help to C. Asinius Pollio, who in 41 BC had been the legate of Antony in Transpadane Gaul, and was by him advised to proceed to Rome and make a personal appeal to Octavian.[2] His appeal was successful and the farm was 'exempted' from confiscation (fundus concessus or exceptus).[3]

Summary

This Eclogue is a dialogue between two shepherds: Tityrus, who represents Virgil, is described as reposing at his ease in the fields among his sheep, when Meliboeus, who has just been ejected from his farm, enters driving before him his weary and unhappy flock.[2]

Analysis

According to T. E. Page, "Although Tityrus represents Virgil, he is in the main an imaginary character and only speaks for the poet occasionally. So too the scenery of the Eclogue is purely imaginary, and does not in any way describe the country round Mantua."[2] J. B. Greenough concurs, "The poet himself … is only dimly shadowed in the person of Tityrus, a herdsman, in dialogue with another, Meliboeus, who represents Virgil's less fortunate neighbors."[4]

References
  1. Wilkinson (1966).
  2. Page (1898).
  3. Page, ed. 1898, pp. vi, 93.
  4. Greenough (1883).

Sources and further reading
  • Eckerman, Chris (2016). "Freedom and Slavery in Vergil's Eclogue 1". Wiener Studien. 129: 257–80.
  • Greenough, J. B., ed. (1883). Publi Vergili Maronis: Bucolica. Aeneis. Georgica. The Greater Poems of Virgil. Vol. 1. Boston, MA: Ginn, Heath, & Co. pp. 1–4. (Public domain)
  • Page, T. E., ed. (1898). P. Vergili Maronis: Bucolica et Georgica. Classical Series. London: Macmillan & Co., Ltd. pp. 93–102. (Public domain)
  • Segal, C. P. (1965). "Tamen Cantabitis, Arcades: Exile and Arcadia in Eclogues One and Nine". Arion: A Journal of Humanities and the Classics. Vol. 4, No. 2 (Summer, 1965), pp. 237–266.
  • Wilkinson, L. P. (1966). "Virgil and the Evictions". Hermes, 94(H. 3), 320–324.
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