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Broken voices on the shore: a note on Aeneid 3.556
NELIS, Damien Patrick
NELIS, Damien Patrick. Broken voices on the shore: a note on Aeneid 3.556. Revue des études anciennes, 1995, vol. 97, no. 3-4, p. 627-631
DOI : 10.3406/rea.1995.4635
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Damien P. NELIS**
Résumé. — L'expression fractasque ad litora voces dans YEnéide 3.556 fait allusion à l'absence des voix des Sirènes au moment du récit où le lecteur, qui est au courant de l'imitation virgilienne d'Homère et d'Apollonios de Rhodes, s'attendrait à les trouver, à savoir près de Charybde et Scylla.
Abstract. — The words fractasque ad litora voces atAeneid 3.556 allude to the absence of the voices of the Sirens at the point in the narrative where the reader who is aware of Vergil's imitation of Homer and Apollonius Rhodius would expect to find them, i.e. near Scylla and
Charybdis.
turn procul e fluctu Trinacria cernitur Aetna,
et gemitum ingentem pelagi pulsataque saxa 555 audimus longe fractasque ad litora voces,
exsultantque vada atque aestu miscentur harenae.
This is Vergil's description of the sights and sounds which confront the Trojans as they sail away from the coast of southern Italy towards Sicily1. In the lines which follow (3.558-60)2, Anchises, recalling the warning of the prophet Helenus concerning the dangers of the passage between Italy and Sicily (3.410-32), associates these phenomena with Scylla and Charybdis.
The phrase fractasque ad litora voces, however, has caused difficulty for commentators. The verb frangere is used in Latin both of waves and noises. With the former, the sense is the same as that of waves « breaking » in English. Here, however, we have broken voces, not fluctus or undas3. When applied to noises the verb expresses the idea of intermittent or reverberating sound4 but no exact parallel for Vergil's use of voces in describing the sound of the sea can be found. Nevertheless, it is generally agreed that Vergil is referring to the sound of waves breaking
* I would like to express my gratitude to R. J. Clare, J. L. Moles, R. G. M. Nisbet, A. M. Wilson and A. J. Woodman for helpful criticism and encouragement. It would be false to assume that they all agree with everything I have written. The weaknesses and mistakes which they have not eradicated are entirely my own responsibility.
** University of Durham.
1. See R. D. WILLIAMS, P. Vergili Moronis Aeneidos Liber Tertius, Oxford, 1962, p. 9 for a convenient map.
2. All references are to the Aeneid, unless stated otherwise.
3. See TLL VI. 1 . 1 244. For fracta — unda see 1 0. 29 1 . 4. SeeTLLVLl. 1245.
REA, T. 97, 1995, n<* 3-4, p. 627 à 631.
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on a shoreline. The word fractas thus expresses both the breaking of the waves and the noise which results from their breaking and Williams5 provides a translation which attempts to express this double sense, « — and the voice of the breakers reverberating on the shore ». There remains, however, the problem of the unparalleled use of voces to refer to this sound. Various solutions have been proposed.
Williams6, noting that this « is a very unusual use of voces, more so than in English », explains the usage by pointing to the personification of the sea already in the use of gemitus (555) and by noting the fact that musical instruments were said to have a vox. Both comments are correct but when taken together they fail to add up to a convincing explanation of Vergil's choice of phrase.
It is difficult to see what musical instruments have to do with waves while the argument for personification of the sea does not account in a sufficiently precise way for Vergil's choice of the word voces at this particular point. It seems reasonable to accept that Vergil presents the turbulent sea as emitting a moaning sound but this neither explains nor exhausts the resonance created by the highly unusual reference to « broken voices ».
La Cerda7 associates the voces emanating from the shore with Circe's description of Scylla at Odyssey 12.85-7 :
ένθα δ'ένι Σκύλλη ναίει δεινον λελακυια·
της η τοι φωνή μεν οση σκύλακος νεογιλής γίγνεται, αύτη δ'αύτε πέλωρ κακόν
At 3.555-7 Vergil is indeed describing the noise made by the sea and rocks around Scylla and Charybdis but it is most unlikely that he has switched the focus of attention solely onto Scylla's barking in line 556 when he refers to gemitum pelagi in line 555 and vada and aestu in 557. It looks very much as if Vergil is here describing the sea and the rocky coast in the vicinity of Scylla and Charybdis rather than the things themselves. Furthermore, the way in which he omits any Homeric-style description of these monstrous phenomena and avoids bringing the Trojans into direct physical contact with them suggests that he would not allude to the yelping of Scylla at this point.
Knauer8 also looks to the Odyssey but to a different beast for an answer. He cites Homer's description (12.264-6) of the approach of Odysseus towards Thrinakia as one model for the Trojans' approach towards Sicily, the island identified from an early date with the Homeric Thrinakia9 :
δη τότ έγών ετι πόντω έών έν νηι μελαίνη μυκηθμοΰ τ' ηκουσα βοών αύλιζομενάων οίων τε βληχήν ·
In this view, therefore, Aeneas hears the voces at the shore just as Odysseus hears the bleating of the sheep there. Vergil's techniques of imitation certainly do not exclude such
5. Op. cit. (n. 2) ad loc.
6. Op. cit. (n. 2) ad loc.
7. P. Virgilii Moronis Aeneìdos libri sex priores argumentis, explicationibus et notis illustrati a loarme Ludovico de la Cerda Toletano e societate Iesu (Madrid, 1617) ad loc.
8. Die Aeneis und Homer, Hypomnemata 7, Göttingen, 1964, p. 193, 384.
9. See, e.g., Α. HEUBECK & Α. Hoekstra, A Commentary on Homer's Odyssey, vol. 2, Oxford, 1989, on 12. 73-126 and A. W. Gomme, A. Andrewes & K. J. DOVER, A Historical Commentary on Thucydides, vol. 4, Oxford, 1970, on 6.2.2.
transformations and it is by no means unreasonable to suggest that in describing the Trojans hearing noises from the Sicilian shoreline Vergil is influenced by the fact that Odysseus and his men hear noises from the coast of Thrinakia. But this still does not suffice to explain why the word voces is used to refer to these noises.
Knauer10 also cites another Homeric model for 3.555f. As Odysseus approaches Scylla and Charybdis we read (Od. 12.201-2) :
'Αλλ' δτε δη την νήσον έλείπομεν, αύτίκ' έπειτα καπνον καΐ μέγα κΰμα ϊδον καΐ δοΰπον άκουσα ·
By a typical fusion, two comparable Homeric passages, the approach towards Scylla and Charybdis and the approach towards Thrinakia, are imitated in Vergil's description of the approach towards that part of Sicily where Scylla and Charybdis are located. Now in terms of Homeric geography the approach towards Scylla and Charybdis involves the passage past the Sirens. This narrative pattern involving, in order of appearance, the Sirens, Scylla, Charybdis, the Planctae and Thrinakia is borrowed by Apollonius Rhodius in his imitation of Odyssey 12 in the fourth book of the Argonautica (885-981). There, Jason sails past the Sirens and Scylla and Charybdis, gets safely though the Planctae and skirts Thrinakia, clearly identified as Sicily11, in a passage which is closely modelled on Odysseus' account of his adventures12. In the corresponding section of the Trojans' voyage Vergil has Scylla and Charybdis and Sicily but no Planctae13 and, crucially, no Sirens. It thus seems reasonable to suggest that the choice of the word voces to describe the noises coming from the shore should be seen as an allusion to the omission of the Sirens at this point in the Vergilian narrative, the famous voices of the Sirens being hinted at by the voices of the waves. On this reading, Vergil describes the voyage towards Scylla and Charybdis in such a way as to allude to the absence of the Sirens at the point in the story where a reader with a knowledge of Homeric geography and Vergil's epic models would have expected to find them.
By the Augustan age there was already a long tradition of scholarly discussion about the geography of the Odyssey. The many places named in Odysseus' account of his wanderings had long been identified with many different locations dotted all around the Mediterranean and beyond. As far as the Sirens were concerned, they were generally located along the western and southern coast of Italy, although in several different places14. Vergil duly places them somewhere along the coast to the south of Cumae at the end of the fifth book of the Aeneid as the Trojans sail northward from Sicily. Given that he accepts this location for the Sirens in book 5, therefore, Vergil could not also include them in his account of the Trojans' voyage along the southern coast of Italy towards Sicily, Etna and Scylla and Charybdis. Hence they are there replaced by the broken voces sounding on the shore in what amounts to a learned footnote for the connoisseur of Homeric geography. Several pieces of evidence can be marshalled in support of this suggestion.
10. Op. cit. (ή. 9) p. 384. Cf. also Apollonius Rhodius, Arg. 2. 553f, 4.924f.
1 1. See the scholia on Arg. 4. 965. On the geographical detail of this section of the voyage see E. Delage, La Géographie dans les Argonautiques d'Apollonios de Rhodes, Bordeaux/Paris, 1930, p. 240-7.
12. Given his explicit mention of the Argo at Odyssey 12. 70, it is possible that Homer has taken the whole section of the narrrative of the voyage past the Sirens from the Argonautic saga ; see K. Meuli, Odyssee undArgonautika, Berlin, 1921, p. 25f, 91-4, R. Merkelbach, Untersuchungen zur Odyssee, Munich, 1969, 204, G. Κ. Gresseth, TAPhA 101 (1970) 203-18, The Homeric Sirens, here p. 217, V. Knight, The Renewal of Epic, Mnemosyne Suppl. 152 (Leiden, 1995) 200-206.
13. Vergil nowhere mentions the Planctae although he draws attention to this omission ; see n. 21 below.
14. See REUIA,\ (1927) col. 296 s.v. Sirenen.
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One important argument is provided by the possibility that Vergil is here making use not only of Homer and the study of his geography but also of another tradition of Homeric scholarship. The Odyssean Sirens were subjected to rationalistic explanation and according to one theory their singing was said to be nothing other than the sound of waves breaking on a rocky shore and throwing back an attractive, melodius sound15. By using the striking image of the broken voices on the shore to evoke the sound of breaking waves Vergil shows his knowledge of this method of explaining away the Sirens' mysterious songs and a learned reader, conversant with the traditions of Homeric scholarship16, would have been able to spot the connection.
Nor is this the end of Vergil's learning in the passage under discussion. According to one tradition concerning the Sirens, they lived on the Sicilian coast under Mt. Etna, a version which can be traced back as far as the third century B.C. and so quite possibly known to Vergil17. It is unlikely to be a coincidence, therefore, when Etna is named (turn procul e fluctu Trinacria cernitur Aetna) just two lines before the mention of the voces. Once again, the learned reader who notes the proximity of Aetna and voces in these two lines and who is aware of the discussion concerning the whereabouts of the home of the Sirens might well remark their absence from this point in the narrative.
When Vergil finally includes the Sirens in his narrative at 5.864-71 he avoids all mention of their song. In doing so he has in mind the tradition by which the Sirens killed themselves after Odysseus succeeded in passing them by18. But there is also an obvious nod in the direction of rationalising exegesis as Vergil, instead of the singing of the Sirens, describes waves beating on a rocky shore19. The relevant verse is 5.866 : turn rauca adsiduo longe sale saxa sonabant.
The sounding rocks in the distance closely resemble the description of the scene at 3.554-5 where the words saxa and longe also occur. It is no doubt Vergil's use of these two different traditions concerning the Homeric Sirens which explains the fact that the melodious breaking of waves produced by rationalisation has given way to the rauca saxa (5.866), the gemitus (3.555) and the broken voices (3.556) left behind after Odysseus' passing20. Given the precedent set by 15. Extant sources for this approach, which include Eustathius, are all post-Vergilian ; see Roscher, vol. IV (1909-15) col. 615, s.v. Seirenen and RE vol. ΙΠΑ,Ι (1927) col. 299, s.v. Sirenen, both authors doubting that this approach can be dated back to the Hellenistic period. On rationalising exegesis of the Homeric texts at an early date, however, see now D. Feeney, The Gods in Epic : Poets and Critics of the Classical Tradition, Oxford, 1991, general index s.v. rationalising interpretations. On Vergil's use of rationalising exegesis in describing Scylla and Charybdis see E. Kraggerud, Aeneisstudien, Symbolae Osloenses Fase. Suppl. 22, Oslo, 1968, p. 160 n. 132.
16. For Vergil's acquaintance with Homeric scholarship see, e.g., R. B. Schlunk, The Homeric Scholia and the Aeneid, Ann Arbor, 1974, P. HARDIE, Virgil's Aeneid : Cosmos and Imperium, Oxford, 1986, 22-32, A. WLOSOK, PLLS 5 (1986) 75-84, Gemina Doctrina : On Allegorical Interpretation, F. CAIRNS, Virgil's Augustan Epic, Cambridge, 1989, p. 177-214.
17. See Athenaeus, Deipnosophistae 7.297b quoting the Hellenistic poetess Hedyle ( = Supplementum Hellenisticum, edd.
H. Lloyd Jones and P. Parsons (Berlina New York, 1983) fr. 456). Cf. Orphic Argonautica 1 248-90 with ¥.V\hK,Argonautiques Orphiques, Paris, 1 987, p. 43 and see also Nonnus, Dionysiaca 13.312 where the Sirens are located at Catana, not far from Etna, on the eastern coast of Sicily.
1 8. See R. D. WILLIAMS, P. Vergili Moronis Aeneidos Liber Quintus, Oxford, 1960, on 864-7. The author of the Orphic Argonautica attributes their suicide to Orpheus' passage and the power of his song ; see Vian, op. cit., n. 18, Notes Complémentaires on 1264-90. On the wider significance of the Sirens' silence see S. Georgia Nugent, « Vergil's "Voice of the Women" in Aeneid V », Arethusa 25, 1992, 255-92, here p. 287f. To her bibliography add W. R. Nethercut, AJPh 107,
1 986, 102-8, Aeneid 5.105 : the horses of Phaethon.
19. See J. CONINGTON and H. Nettleship, The Works of Virgil, vol. 2, London, 18844, on 5.864. Servius ad loc. records another explanation. The Sirens meretrices fuerunt, quae transeúntes quoniam deducebant ad egestatem, hisfictae sunt inferre naufragio.
20. It is worth noting here that at Juvenal 2.111 fracta voce is used of a shrill effeminate voice ; see E. Courtney, A Commentary on the Satires of Juvenal, London, 1980, ad loc.
Homer and Apollonius who, to repeat, both employ the narrative pattern made up of the Sirens, Scylla, Charybdis, Planctae and Thrinakia, it would be natural for the reader of Aeneid 5 to expect the Planctae and/or Scylla and Charybdis to appear after the Sirens. Instead, Vergil omits these dangers but describes the Sirens in such a way as to recall both the Homeric and Apollonian Planctae, thereby drawing attention to the fact that these dangers are emphatically absent21. The technique is exactly the same as that which he had earlier employed in describing Scylla and Charybdis in the third book. Vergil has taken a narrative, common to both Homer and Apollonius, containing the Sirens, Scylla and Charybdis and Thrinakia (= Sicily) and distributed it, using it in both books 3 and 5 of the Aeneid. In the third book he includes Scylla and Charybdis and Sicily, in the fifth book Sicily and the Sirens. In each case he describes the figures he includes in such a way as to bring to mind those he omits. This distribution of the Homeric- Apollonian model narrative is highlighted by a whole series of correspondances and similiarities which link the two Vergilian episodes in which Scylla and Charybdis and the Sirens appear.
Leaving Sicily at 5.112η, after sacrifice to the storm-gods (Tempestatibus, 772) and with Aeneas pouring wine-libations (stansprocul in prora, 775), the Trojans sail northward along the coast of Italy. They turn the yard-arms (cornua, 832) from side to side and Palinurus' ship leads the fleet (princeps, 833). As they sail on, after the loss of Palinurus, they drift towards the Sirens' shore where waves beat against rocks in the distance (longe, saxa, 866) and are led to safety away from these scopulos (864) by pater Aeneas (867). Finally, they land at Cumae ( — Cumarum adlabitur oris, 6.2), the crossing from Sicily to Italy complete. This whole section corresponds to the description in the third book of the voyage along southern Italy towards Sicily. At 3.52 Iff the Trojans approach the Italian coastline. Anchises (stans celsa inpuppi — , 527) prepares wine-libations (525-6) and prays to the gods tempestatumque potentes (528). At 3.548ff, after the landing at Castrum Minervae, they sail on from Italy towards Sicily, turning the cornua (549)22. Soon they hear the sound of waves beating on a distant shore (saxa, longe, 555-6) as they sail towards Scylla and Charybdis. But with Palinurus leading the way (primus, 561) they are led to safety away from these scopulos (559) by pater Anchises (558). Finally, they arrive in the land of the Cyclopes ( — Cyclopum adlabimur oris, 569), the journey from Italy to Sicily complete.
These detailed similarities between the two passages show them to be intimately connected in the overall structure of the narrative of the voyage in the first half of the Aeneid?·2. Within this web of links and connections, the voces near Scylla and Charybdis can be seen to be in parallel with the Sirens, who in Vergil1 s account have lost their voices, the only sound being that of waves beating on a lonely shore.
21. With 5.866 compare Od. 12.60 (see Knauer, op. cit., η. 9, p. 393) and Arg. 4.924f (see F. ROTTEN, De Vergila Studii*
Apollonianis, Münster, 1912, p. 56 and D. P. Nelis, The Aeneid and the Argonautica of Apollonius Rhodius, Diss. Belfast, 1988, p. 131) ; cf. also Arg. 2. 553f, cited by J. Conington and H. Nettleship, op. cit., η. 20 ad loe. and M. Tartari Chersoni, Enciclopedia Virgiliana, vol. 4, Rome, 1988, s.v. raucus, p. 406.
22. The word has this technical nautical sense only twice in the poem, here and at 5. 832.
23. On the relationship between the voyage described in book 3 and the account of the whole voyage in the rest of the first six books see R. B. Lloyd, « Aeneid 3 : A New Approach », AJPh 78, 1957, 133-151, here 146-151, G. K. Galinsky, « Aeneid V and the Aeneid », AJPh 89, 1968, 157-85 and W. Wimmel, Gnomon 33, 1961, 50, review of G. MONACO, // libro dei ludi, Palermo, 1957. See also W. Moskalew, Formular Language and Poetic Design in the Aeneid, Mnemosyne Suppl. 73, Leiden, 1982, p. 93-4 on Vergilian repetition in the description of seafaring.
