Vergil's "Aeneid" and the "Argonautica" of Apollonius Rhodius

Abstract

This major study of the Aeneid's indebtedness to the Argonautica of Apollonius Rhodius follows on from G.N. Knauer's monumental study of Homeric influence on Vergil, Die Aeneis und Homer (1964). But extra levels of complexity are involved. Apollonius himself was engaged in thoroughgoing imitation of Homer, as Nelis demonstrates in considerable detail. A deep understanding of Apollonius' interaction with IIomer is essential for the exploration of how Vergil, in full awareness of Apollonius' use of Homer, reworked the characters and episodes of the Argonautica. Structurally also the Aeneid adapts not only the broad outlines of the Iliad and of the Odyssey, but also and simultaneously that of the Argonautica. A study of the Aeneid in relation to the Argonautica must therefore also be a study of the Argonautica in relation to the Homeric poems; and our understanding of Vergil's imitation of Homer is profoundly affected by the Apollonian dimension.