commentaries. See H. Nettleship, Essays in Latin Literature, xi., and Comparetti, Vergil in the Middle Ages, ch. 5.
Editions.—The editions of Virgil are innumerable; Heyne (1767–1800), Forbiger (1872–75) and Ribbeck (1859–66) in Germany, Benoist (1876) in France, and Conington (completed by Nettleship, and edited by Haverfield) in England, are perhaps the most important. Good school editions in English have been produced by Page, Sidgwick and Papillon. Conington’s work, however, is without question the best in English.
Translations.—Famous English translations have been made by Dryden and by a host of others since his day. Since the middle of the 19th century the most important are Conington {Aeneid in verse, whole works in prose); J. W. Mackail (Aeneid and Georgics in prose); William Morris (Aeneid in verse); Lord Justice Bowen {Eclogues and Aeneid, i.–vi. in verse); Canon Thornhill (verse); C. J. Billson (verse, 1906); J. Rhoades (verse, new ed., 1907). For essays on translating Virgil, see Conington, Miscellaneous Works, vol. i .; R. Y. Tyrrell, Latin Poetry (appendix).
Authorities.—For full bibliographies of Virgil consult Schanz, Gesch. der Römischen Litteratur (1899) (in Iwan von Müller’s series, Handbuch der Klassischen Altertums-Wissenschaft), and Teuffel, History of Roman Literature, edited by L. Schwabe and tr. by G. C. W. Warr (1900). On the life of Virgil: Nettleship’s Ancient Lives of Vergil (1879) discusses the authorities, printing one of the lives, which he shows to be by Suetonius. On the Eclogues: Glaser, V. als Naturdichler n. Theist (1880); Cattault, Étude sur les Bucoliques de V. (1897). On the Georgics: Morsch, De Graecis in Georgicis a V. expressis (1878); Norden, “V.- studien” (in Hermes, vol. 28, 1893) (Norden has little patience with “aesthetic criticism”). On the Aeneid: Schwegler, Röm. Gesch. vol. i. (1853); Cauer, De fabulis Graecis ad Romam conditam pertinentibus; Hild, La Légende d’Enée avant V. (1883); Forstemann, Zur Gesch. des Aeneasmythus; H. de la Ville de Mirmont, Apollonios de Rhodes et Virgile (1894) (rather too long), Plüss, V. u . die epische Kunst (1884); Georgii, Die politische Tendenz der Aen (1880); Boissier, Nouvelles promenades archéologiques (1886) (trans. under title The Country of Horace and Virgil, by D. Havelock Fisher, 1895), Gibbon, Critical Observations on the Sixth Book of the Aeneid (1770); Boissier, La Religion romaine d'Auguste aux Antonins (1884) (with section on sixth Aeneid); Ettig, Acheruntica (Leipziger Studien, 1891), Norden, “V.-studien” (in Hermes, vol. 28, 1893), on sixth Aeneid, and papers in Neue Jahrbücher für kl. Altertum (1901); Dieterich, Nekyia (1893) (on Apocalypse of Peter and ancient teaching on the other life—a valuable book), Henry, Aeneidea (1873–79) (a book of very great learning, wit, sense and literary judgment; the author, an Irish physician, gave twenty years to it, examining MSS., exploring Virgil’s country, and reading every author whom Virgil could have used and nearly every ancient writer who used Virgil).
Virgil literature: Sainte-Beuve, Étude sur Virgile (one of the great books on Virgil); Comparetti, Virgilio nel medio Evo (1872)—Eng. tr., Vergil in the Middle Ages, E. F. M. Benecke (1895) (a book of very great and varied interest); Heinze, Virgil’s epische Technik (1902); W. Y. Sellar, Roman Poets of the Augustan Age: Virgil (2nd ed. 1883); Glover, Studies in Virgil (1904). Essays in the following: F. W. H. Myers, Essays [Classical] (1883), the most famous English essay on Virgil; J. R. Green, Stray Studies (1876) (an excellent study of Aeneas); W. Warde Fowler, A Year with the Birds (on Virgil’s bird-lore); Nettleship, Essays in Latin Literature (1884); Tyrrell, Latin Poetry (1898); Patin, Essais sur la poésie Latine (4th ed. 1900) (one of the finest critics of Latin literature); Goumy, Les Latins (1892) (a volume of very bright essays); J. W. Mackail, Latin Literature (3rd ed. 1899). (T. R. G.)
The Virgil Legend.
Virgil’s great popularity In the middle ages is to be partly explained by the fact that he was to a certain extent recognized by the Church. He was supposed to have prophesied the coming of Christ in the fourth Eclogue, and by some divines the Aeneid was held to be an allegory of sacred things. This position was sufficiently emphasized by Dante when he chose him from among all the sages of antiquity to be his guide in the Divina Commedia. Ancient poets and philosophers were commonly transformed by medieval writers into necromancers; and Virgil and Aristotle became popularly famous, not for poetry and science, but for their supposed knowledge of the black art. Naples appears to have been the home of the popular legend of Virgil, which represented him as the special protector of the city, but was probably never quite independent of learned tradition.
One of the earliest references to the magical skill of Virgil[1] occurs in a letter of the imperial chancellor Conrad of Querfurt (1194), reproduced by Arnold of Lübeck in the continuation of the Chronica Slavorum of Helmold. John of Salisbury alludes to the brazen fly fabricated by Virgil, Helmand (d. 1227) speaks of similar marvels in a work from which Vincent of Beauvais has borrowed; and Gervase of Tilbury, in his Otia Imperiaia (1212), and Alexander of Neckam (d. 1217), in De Naturis Rerum, have reproduced these traditions, with additions. German and French poets did not overlook this accessory to their repertory. The Roman de Cléomadis of Adenes li rois (12th century) and the Image du Monde of Gauthier de Metz (1245) contain numerous references to the prodigies of the enchanter. Reynard the Fox informs King Lion that he had from the wise Virgil a quantity of valuable receipts. He also plays a considerable part in the popular folk-tale The Seven Wise Masters, and appears in the Gesta Romanorum and that curious guidebook for pilgrims, the Mirabilia Romae. He is to be found in John Gower’s Confessio Amantis and in John Lydgate’s Bochas. A Spanish romance, Vergilios, is included by E. de Ochoa in his Tesoro (Paris, 1838), and Juan Ruiz, arch priest of Hita (d. c. 1360), also wrote a poem on the subject. Many of the tales of magic throughout Europe were referred to Virgil, and gradually developed into a completely new life, strangely different from that of the real hero. They were collected in French under the title of Les Faitz Merveilleux de Virgille (c. 1499), a quarto chapbook of ten pages, which became extremely popular, and was printed, with more or less additional matter, in other languages. The English version, beginning “This is reasonable to wryght the mervelus dedes done by Virgilius,” was printed about 1520. We are told how Virgil beguiled the devil at a very early age, in the same fashion as the fisherman persuaded the jinnee in the Arabian Nights to re-enter Solomon’s casket. Another reproduction of a widely spread tale was that of the lady who kept Virgil suspended in a basket. To revenge the affront the magician extinguished all the fires in the city, and no one could rekindle them without subjecting the lady to an ordeal highly offensive to her modesty. Virgil made for the emperor a castle in which he could see and hear everything done or said in Rome, an ever-blooming orchard, statues of the tributary princes which gave warning of treason or rebellion, and a lamp to supply light to the city. He abducted the soldan’s daughter, and built for her the city of Naples upon a secure foundation of eggs. At last, having performed many extraordinary things, he knew that his time was come. In order to escape the common lot he placed all his treasures in a castle defended by images unceasingly wielding iron flails, and directed his confidential servant to hew him in pieces, which he was to salt and place in a barrel, in the cellar, under which a lamp was to be kept burning. The servant was assured that after seven days his master would revive, a young man. The directions were carried out; but the emperor, missing his medicine-man, forced the servant to divulge the secret and to quiet the whirling flails. The emperor and his retinue entered the castle and at last found the mangled corpse. In his wrath he slew the servant, whereupon a little naked child ran thrice round the barrel, crying, “Cursed be the hour that ye ever came here,” and vanished.
For the legends connected with Virgil see especially D. Comparetti, Virgilio nel medio evo (2nd ed., Florence, 1896; English trans., E. F. M. Benecke, 1895). The chief original source for the Neapolitan legends is the 14th-century Cronica di Parterope. See further W.J. Thoms, Early Eng. Prose Romances (1858); G. Brunet, Les Faitz merveilleux de Virgile (Geneva, 1867); E. Duméril, “Virgile enchanter” (Melanges archeologiques, 1850); Gervase of Tilbury, Otia Imper. (ed. Liebrecht, 1856); P. Schwubbe, Virgilius per mediam aetatem (Paderborn, 1852); Siebenhaar, De fabulis quae media aetate de Virgilio circumf. (Berlin, 1837); J. G. T. Graesse, Beiträge zur Litt. u. Sage des Mittelalters (1850); Bartsch, “Gedicht auf. d. Zaub. Virgil” (Pfeiffer’s Germania, iv. 1859); F. Liebrecht, “Der Zauberer Virgilius” (ibid. x . 1865); K.L. Roth, “Über d. Zaub. Virgilius” (ibid. iv. 1859); W. Victor, “Der Ursprung der Virgilsage” (Zeit. f. rom. Phil. i. 1877); A. Graf, Roma nella memoria e nelle imaginazioni del medio evo (Turin, 1882); F. W. Genthe, Leben und Fortleben des Publius Virgilius Maro als Dichter und Zauberer (2nd ed., Magdeburg, 1857). (M. Br.)
VIRGIL, POLYDORE (c. 1470–1355), English historian, of Italian extraction, otherwise known as P. V. Castellensis, was a kinsman of Cardinal Hadrian Castellensis, a native of Castro in Etruria. His father’s name is said to have been George Virgil; his great-grandfather, Anthony Virgil, “a man well skilled in medicine and astrology,” had professed philosophy at Paris, as did Polydore’s own brother and protégé John Matthew Virgil, at Pavia, in 1517. A third brother was a London merchant in 1511. Polydore was born at Urbino, is said to have been educated at Bologna, and was probably in the service of Guido Ubaldo, duke of Urbino, before 1498, as in the dedication of his first work, Liber Proverbiorum (April 1498), he styles himself this prince’s client. Polydore’s second book, De Inventoribus Rerum, is dedicated to Guido’s tutor,
- ↑ The Irish apostle to Carinthia, St Virgilius, bishop of Salzburg (d. 784), who held original views on the subject of antipodes, may have been the real eponym of the legend.
