The Aeneid demanded the most effort I have ever invested in a piece of literature. During my sophomore year of high school, I decided to take AP Latin to fulfill the last class of a language requirement. We focused on two main works: one was the detailed diaries of Julius Caesar on his military conquests across the continent, and the other was one of the most famous ancient poems, the Aeneid. I spent hours sprawled out on my bedroom floor, surrounded by papers containing Virgil’s toolbelt of poetic devices, countless lists of vocabulary, and a whiteboard filled with lines of a dead language. Virgil’s greatest work had become a core factor in my graduation status, leading to hours of struggling to understand its dactylic hexameter and forming a deeper understanding of not just the poetry itself but its impact.
I thought the four-hour AP exam would be my goodbye to Virgil, as my interactions with the dead language reduced to helping my sister study for Latin tests of her own. However, here I am once again, a freshman in college, spending nearly two days translating these same lines in a wildly different format, willing to do anything to be back in my bedroom with that dreaded whiteboard. Once again, here I am translating Latin, but this time the Latin was provided by a French propaganda pamphlet from 1648, a “book” I had selected because of its French title, which I could not understand but which intrigued me to see how this very obviously French item could appear under a search for “the Aeneid, Virgil.” I soon came to find that the same lines used to describe Neptune and Aeneas’ comrades were used to describe French royalty. What was this pamphlet, and why was I, yet again, trying to understand the cryptic poetry of my dear old friend, Virgil?
In Special Collections
Throughout my time in Special Collections, I looked at several copies of the Aeneid. However, during my second visit, I asked to see a book with a long, French name: Le Virgile Mazarin, ov, : L'apres-sovpee de Messievrs de S. Germain, which translates to The Virgil Mazarin, for the After-Supper of Gentlemen of Saint Germain. When I held this book, it was not quite a book, but six pages, about half the size of a regular sheet of printer paper, held together with staples. As I turned the pages, they felt fragile and thin, nearly transparent. The text itself was French and Latin, the Latin lines italicized and slightly smaller. The cheap nature of the product implied and later confirmed by librarians that I was looking at one of the thousands of propaganda pamphlets mass-produced and spread through the streets of Paris, Saint Germain, and other French cities from 1500 to 1900.
Confused, I consulted the librarians and discovered that pamphlets like this one were the social media of 17th-century France, comparable to X, the modern-day app formerly known as Twitter. Similar to X, French propaganda pamphlets had a lot to say about the government. Although these two media sources are comparable, the similarities end there. These pamphlets still require a level of literacy and status to be acquired and read. This pamphlet specifically addresses the “Gentlemen of St. Germain,” indicating that these were meant to be read by a specific audience, whereas with X, anyone with access to the internet, can spread or consume information. However, both do a respectable job of spreading media, for in the same year that this pamphlet was published, 1648, the Fronde began.
The Fronde was a series of civil wars in France during and partially caused by the Franco-Spanish War. During this time King Louis XIV was just five years old, leaving France in the hands of Cardinal Marizan of Italy, who raised taxes to record levels, causing distress to Parliament and the public. In the next century, thousands of pamphlets were printed by a publisher by the name of Chez Mathurin Henault of Paris, voicing criticism and frustration with the situation, many of which are housed in Special Collections. Other pamphlets spoke on similar political issues: one titled, “Burlesque Verses Sent to Monsieur Scarron on the Arrival of the Convoy in Paris,” and another, “The Triumphal Chariot of Peace, in Burlesque Verse.” One can tell by the use of “burlesque verses” that these pamphlets were made to mock or make fun of their subject.
The Virgil Mazarin begins by addressing a “Poor town in France'' and sympathizes with its recent financial issues due to the actions of Mazarin. A mock conversation between the Queen Mother, the Duke of Orleans, the Prince of Conde, Cardinal Mazarin, and the genius of the city speaking in lines from the Aeneid follows. Some of the lines I found most powerful were spoken by the genius of the city, closing the conversation with, “O passi graviora! Dabit Deus his quoque finem; Languentes revocate animos, mastumque timorem,” which comes from two different passages, the first phrase from line 199 of Book I, translating to “O comrades, you who have suffered worse, this also God will end,” and the second phrase from line 202 of Book I, translating to, “Recall your courage patients and banish fear.” In both uses of these lines, the respective leaders, the genius of Paris and Aeneas, call to their comrades, asking for their bravery and courage in their respective future battles. This is what makes this piece of history so unique and interesting: the parallels and the author’s use of the ancient words of Virgil. But why? What was the Aeneid doing in a French propaganda pamphlet?
Painful Translation
The Aeneid was originally written during a period of political unrest in Rome, following centuries of civil unrest and long, unending military campaigns, many of which were documented by Julius Caesar (other texts I struggled with in the AP Latin curriculum). After Caesar's death, Augustus, his successor, named himself princeps civitatis of Rome, translating to “first citizen” but in reality meaning emperor. This marked the fall of the Roman Republic and the birth of the Roman Empire. Although the Pax Romana would soon follow, Augustus was succeeding several centuries of civil war and unease, and what better way to win over public opinion than propaganda? Historians have recently argued that Virgil wrote Aeneas as an archetype of Augustus, painting his hero as a strong ruler who predestined the emperor himself, legitimizing Augustus’ power. Because themes of divine intervention and destiny are so prominent in the Aeneid and a large part of Aeneas’ success was due to support from his mother Venus and other Roman Gods, the implied comparison of Rome’s first leader and their current one created a divine validity to Augustus’ power.
Even though the Aeneid provided legitimacy to Augustus as emperor, it did nearly the exact opposite in Le Virgile Mazarin. The mock conversation itself is made up of forty-two lines of Latin, only eighteen of which contain lines from the Aeneid. These 18 lines are composed of seven different books, leading me to believe that the purpose of using the Aeneid is not for the plot, as each line disconnects from the last. Even the lines used are often tweaked or changed, replacing verbs or removing adjectives.
After realizing Google was not a great Latin translator, I rekindled my relationship with my favorite online Latin dictionary. I found that the author openly challenged Mazarin’s legitimacy as a ruler and critiqued the Queen’s recent actions, claiming her only accomplishment has been “deprivement of property.” The conversation ends, much to my amusement, with the “Genius of Paris” calling the Mazarin a “spineless creature” that should go back to Italy, comparing his role in Paris to the role of straw in the production of milk and cattle in the production of liquor. These simple comparisons ultimately deem the Mazarin useless, seeing as though cows are not very important in the process of manufacturing alcohol.
The Turn of Centuries
Both the Aeneid and the pamphlet are examples of political propaganda, commenting on the legitimacy of the current ruler, one for and one against. Their ideas of divine right, patriotism, and honor reign true in politics throughout the modern day. As someone who dedicated a lot of time and energy to understanding not just the literal translation but the true meaning behind these lines, it's almost painful to see these lines sloppily cut and pasted for political use. The opening line, “Quid gravidam bellis urbem corda aspera tentas?” (“Why meddle with savage hearts, and a city teeming with war?”) comes from a passage in Book 10, where the main antagonist of the Aeneid, Juno, is pleading the gods to help her stop Aeneas. Following this, another line from the Aeneid is used, from a direct quote of Aeneas. Why combine two direct quotes from the main hero and villain in one breath? This leads me to believe that the lines were used for their literal translation only, when they could have been so much more.
The Aeneid holds much more meaning behind its lines, with themes of nationalism, divine right, leadership, and war, many of which emerged in 17th-century France. When I first began dissecting the pamphlet, I was hoping it would act as an ode to the great poem, using its lines to argue for a brighter, more just political future. But to my disappointment, it was not. Instead, the pamphlet was a Frankenstein version of the Aeneid, using it to add interest and value to its words. Despite this, it still manages to provide a parallel for the historical importance of the Aeneid, just not with the detail and care it deserves.
Before I visited Special Collections, the Aeneid was a mythical epic, the epitome of Roman literature, but after finding this pamphlet, spending hours translating, and researching the historical context of not just French propaganda pamphlets but the Aeneid itself, Virgil’s 9,896 lines of poetry mean so much more to me. They represent thousands of years of political propaganda, justification for an emperor shifted into condemnation for a cardinal. Unfortunately, while literature and political propaganda are not mutually exclusive, Le Virgile Mazarin falls short of the former title, devaluing the words of Virgil with spliced lines and a fumbled use of them. But realizing how disappointed I was in this pamphlet allowed me to discover how meaningful the original work is to me. The time I spent with the Aeneid nearly three years ago, translating it in my bedroom, has stayed with me as more than work toward a simple language requirement. The Aeneid embodies the immortal question of who should be in charge and why, originally with a narrative pushing in favor of one man and later used to push against another.
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Funding for this series—which allowed HH to pay student writers and editors—was generously provided by the Friends of the UW-Madison Libraries. Special thanks are due, as well, to the staff of Special Collections, and especially to Lisa Wettleson, who guided students through the process of learning how to conduct original research in rare book and archival libraries.
About the author: Riley Soutar is a freshman studying Applied Mathematics, Engineering, and Physics. Her interest in classics began with Latin classes in high school and was rekindled during her enrollment in a history of literature course, where she first came into contact with Special Collections.
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