Classical Studies - Aeneid

'A great pounding he took by land and sea at the hands of the heavenly gods'. Are the gods more of a hindrance than a help to Aeneas and the outcome of his mission? (55 marker)

In Virgil’s Aeneid, I personally find the major gods to be more of a help than a hindrance, however Juno, the antagonist, causes many a hindrance.

To start with the helpful gods; Neptune is helpful to Aeneas and his mission as he calms the storm allowing Aeneas to continue with the last leg of his journey. Neptune feels Aeolus is trespassing in his territory as he is the only person with the jurisdiction to decide what happens at sea. Neptune dispersed the swell and gave them a clear sky and calm sea. The calming of the storm allowed Aeneas and his men to speed to the nearest land, Libya. This helped Aeneas and his mission as Neptune removed an obstacle for him and allowed him and the remainder of his men and ships to travel to dry land. This allowed Aeneas to continue his journey sooner than if he had lost his ships and his men.

This point about Neptune being helpful is cancelled out in the argument regarding the gods being helpful, as the only reason he had to calm the storm was because Juno and Aeolus had conjured it up. Juno acts as the primary antagonist due to the fact that Trojan Paris did not judge her as most beautiful in the beauty contest, and also because she is patron of Carthage and knows that Aeneas’s Roman descendants are destined to destroy Carthage. She asks Aeolus to conjure up a storm with waves like ‘mountains’ and tells Aeolus to ‘overwhelm their ships and sink them’. Her pettiness causes this trouble for Aeneas in book 1 and without her stirring up trouble, Aeneas’ journey would run much smoother. For this reason, she is a complete hindrance to Aeneas and his mission.

As well as causing the storm, Juno is also unhelpful in the way that she causes more unbearable pain and suffering for Aeneas by involving Allecto in her mission to sabotage Aeneas’ journey and make...