Vergil 2 - Laocoon

Context

It is essential to remember that all of Book 2 (and Book 3!) are told through Aeneas’ voice as he narrates his journey to Dido. Right before this passage, Aeneas is relating the plot of the Greeks, how some of them hid themselves within the horse, left behind supposedly as an offering to Minvera for safe passage home, and the rest of them went to hide out of sight behind the nearby island of Tenedos. Naturally, he only knows all this in hindsight. Laocoon, the subject of our reading in Book 2, is a high ranking Trojan priest who opposes bringing the horse into the city.

• Steadman Commentaries for Pliny/Vergil.
  • click on the link under 1.

Laocoon Intro

Primus ibi ante omnis magna comitante caterva 40

Laocoon ardens summa decurrit ab arce,

et procul ‘o miseri, quae tanta insania, cives?

creditis avectos hostis? aut ulla putatis

dona carere dolis Danaum? sic notus Ulixes?

aut hoc inclusi ligno occultantur Achivi, 45

aut haec in nostros fabricata est machina muros,

inspectura domos venturaque desuper urbi,

aut aliquis latet error; equo ne credite, Teucri.

quidquid id est, timeo Danaos et dona ferentis.’

sic fatus ualidis ingentem viribus hastam 50

in latus inque feri curvam compagibus alvum

contorsit. stetit illa tremens, uteroque recusso

insonuere cavae gemitumque dedere cavernae.

et, si fata deum, si mens non laeva fuisset,

impulerat ferro Argolicas foedare latebras, 55

Troiaque nunc staret, Priamique arx alta maneres.