AENEID II SUMMARY Flashcards
Beginning
Priam is a futile old man. With his shoulders trembling due to old age, he rushes into a crowd of enemy soldiers, about to die. Hecuba and her daughters sit around an altar in vain. Hecuba asks her husband what has crossed his mind to making him carry such weapons. She warns him that he will die with them if he does not watch over everyone.
Middle I
Polites escapes the slaughter of Pyrrhus and flees through the enemy, wounded. However, Pyrrhus follows him and kills him with a sword. Priam is close to dying when he angrily confronts Pyrrhus for what he did to his son. He makes a weak attempt to spear him. Pyrrhus then grabs him, drags him to the altar, and kills him with a spear.
Middle II
He leaves his mutilated dead body on a beach, marking the end of Priam’s fate. There is a fire in Troy and Anchises starts to feel the heat. He does not want to see the fall of troy and asks to be left behind. Aeneas tries to convince his father and little Iulus to be his companions in a journey because he cannot just leave them to die, but Creusa is also begging him to protect their house.
End
He instructs his father to carry the household gods and they approach the gates. Just before they reach safety, the group is attacked by a band of Greek warriors. Aeneas runs to safety in a panic and realizes that Creusa is no longer behind him. He turns back to look for her, but her ghost urges him to go on. She tells him to go to the banks of the river Tiber, where he will be successful. He tries to hug her, but she disappears. He returns to his companions and the story ends with Aeneas hoisting his father onto his soldiers and looking over the landscape at the mountains in the distance.
