[577] Heyne, following the editors before Heins., reads ‘ignis,’ which, if taken with ‘terrorem,’ would give a good sense, ‘terrorem caedis et ignis’ being the alarm of fire and sword. But this reading is supported only by Gud. and some inferior MSS. (including the Balliol) and by Donatus; while the authority of the other MSS. and Serv. is in favour of ‘igni,’ which was the reading of Heins., and has been restored by Wagn. ‘Igni’ also may derive some confirmation from the structure of the verse, which is similar to 6. 255, “Ecce autem primi sub lumina solis et ortus.” Poetically speaking, ‘igni’ seems preferable: that is, ‘medio in crimine’ would be improved by amplification, while ‘terrorem’ would perhaps be weakened by it. On the other hand it must be admitted that ‘ignis criminis’ is somewhat a bold metaphor in Latin; it is helped out however by the zeugma, which enables us to take ‘medio in crimine caedis et igni’ as a kind of hendiadys, “in the midst of the furious outcry at the slaughter,” and supported by 11. 225, “medio in flagrante tumultu,” where, though the expression is much more common, the image is really the same, and the turn of the words sufficiently similar to make it probable that Virg. wrote ‘igni’ here.
This text is part of:
John Conington. P. Vergili Maronis opera. P. Vergili Maronis Opera. The works of. Virgil. , with a Commentary by John Conington, M.A. and Henry Nettleship, M.A. London. Whittaker and Co., Ave Maria Lane;. George Bell and Sons, York Street, Covent Garden. 1876.
The National Endowment for the Humanities provided support for entering this text.
This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 United States License.
An XML version of this text is available for download, with the additional restriction that you offer Perseus any modifications you make. Perseus provides credit for all accepted changes, storing new additions in a versioning system.