Latin: a tongue of divine status

Abstract

On the basis of Juno’s request (vs. 819-828, Gredos; 818-829, Latin text, Cátedra) and taking into account the political and ethical sense of the Aeneid and the great pains Virgil took with his work, the value of the dress, name and tongue have on
the construction of Romanness is analyzed. The poet builds symbolically upon two similes –opposing Turnus and Aeneas–
the heroic profile of the Roman, the government, peacemaker, the pater, and expresses Juno’s cry and Jupiter’s consent, in the
divine colloquium, bringing forth the nobleness of the Latin tongue. My aim is to highlight in different passages of the book, possible readings of Virgilian discourse that are also pertinent in other sequences in the epic.