Vergil Aeneid: Book VI Translation

By David Pritchard

Through this verse translation of Vergil's Book VI of the Aeneid we journey with Aeneas through the Underworld to meet his father. Accompanied by Sibyl, the prophetess, who instructs him first to pluck the Golden Bough that will ensure his safe passage, Aeneas descends into the Underworld where he passes crowds of the dead waiting to be ferried across the river Styx before being carried across himself by Charon the Ferryman. 

We encounter monsters of legend like Cerberus the three headed dog who guards the gates of the Underworld, and dead souls in the Field of Mourning who are resigned with regret to their fate. We are moved by the plight of Dido, Queen of Carthage, and Aeneas’ lover who took her own life when he abandoned her. 

It’s a tale full of terror, sadness and longing but also of courage and resolve – rich in vivid poetic imagery to fire the imagination.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Troubador Publishing Ltd
• Release date: Apr 28, 2022
• ISBN: 9781803139128

David Pritchard

David Pritchard is an eminent television producer. He is best known for his work producing the groundbreaking Keith Floyd and Rick Stein cookery series for the BBC. He lives in London.

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Copyright © 2022 David Pritchard

The moral right of the author has been asserted.

Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of research or private study, or criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, this publication may only be reproduced, stored or transmitted, in any form or by any means, with the prior permission in writing of the publishers, or in the case of reprographic reproduction in accordance with the terms of licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside those terms should be sent to the publishers.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

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ISBN 978 1803139 128

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Cover illustration ‘Charon the Ferryman’

by Adam Pritchard

‘Since it is said that the King of the Underworld’s gate and the dark swamp

Flooded by Acheron lie at this place, then permit me to go and

Visit my father and gaze at his dear face. Show me the way and

Fling wide open the venerate gateways…..’

Contents

Translator’s Note

Acknowledgements

Aeneid Book VI

Glossary

Translator’s Note

I have my primary school to thank for my love of classical myths and poetry. Late in the school day the teacher would fire our imaginations by reading stories from Aesop’s Fables or myths of the Greeks and Romans, sometimes we recited poetry. To this day I can still reel off the introduction to Browning’s ‘The Pied Piper of Hamelin’.

Later, like many grammar school boys and girls we were taught Latin and to me this was an opportunity to explore further these wonderful stories. Studying Vergil’s Aeneid Book IV – ‘The Tragedy of Dido’ – proved no exception though the grammar, syntax and vocabulary always proved particularly challenging.

Like for many, my knowledge of Latin faded over the years though a copy of West’s prose translation of the Aeneid remained on our bookshelf. Then in 2017 two events coincided.

I went with Ruth, my wife, to see Jez Butterworth’s play ‘The Ferryman’. The politically charged plot examines ‘The Troubles’ in Northern Ireland, the loss of a beloved one and rediscovery of his body. It’s studded with literary references and allusions from Yeats and Heaney among others. But most prominent is the reference to Vergil. The character Uncle Pat quotes from Aeneid Book VI is Charon who may only take souls across the Styx whose bodies have been laid to rest – hence the title of the play.

The play had a profound effect on me, it inspired me not only to read Vergil in translation but to read it in Latin. The only way I could realise this was to go back to basics and revise the grammar. After some research I chose the series, ‘So you really want to learn Latin’ published by Galore Park. It takes you from Amo, Amas, Amat to Gerundive of Obligation with a series of exercises to cement the syntax, grammar and vocabulary.

As luck would have