How not to plan a career

Anyway. Here's how not to plan a career: (a) split up with girlfriend; (b) junk college; (c) go to work in record shop; (d) stay in record shops for rest of life. You see those pictures of people in Pompeii and you think, how weird: one quick game of dice after your tea and you're frozen, and that's how people remember you for the next few thousand years.

holidays

Holidays are here again and, just like the birds in Aeneid VI, I'm escaping the frigidus annus, and off to the terris... apricis of Queensland for a week.

regna pallida, dis invisa

One of the most exciting and vivid passages in Aeneid VIII comes at the climax of the story of Hercules and Cacus. Hercules has succeeded in tearing the roof from Cacus' cave, and Cacus responds by spewing out great clouds of smoke and fire.

Pop Classics

I stumbled across a great blog the other day (to which I've added a link in the sidebar) called Pop Classics. It's a little bit scary how closely the author's taste and sense of humour mirrors my own; there are posts on Monty Python, Red Dwarf, Discworld, Buffy and many other things. Hours of enjoyment...

Birthplaces of Roman Authors

Strangely, most of the Latin authors we read today were not actually born in the city of Rome, but moved there from the provinces. This is true of Virgil, Cicero, Livy, Catullus, Ovid, Horace and many more.

This map shows the birthplaces of some of the most famous Roman writers:



View Birthplaces of Roman Authors in a larger map

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Audax Pallas

Question 3

Ut celsas videre rates atque inter opacum
adlabi nemus et tacitis incumbere remis,
terrentur visu subito cunctique relictis
consurgunt mensis. Audax quos rumpere Pallas
sacra vetat raptoque volat telo obvius ipse
et procul e tumulo: `Iuvenes, quae causa subegit
ignotas temptare vias, quo tenditis?' inquit.
`Qui genus? Unde domo? Pacemne huc fertis an arma?'
Tum pater Aeneas puppi sic fatur ab alta
paciferaeque manu ramum praetendit olivae:
`Troiugenas ac tela vides inimica Latinis,
quos illi bello profugos egere superbo.
Euandrum petimus. Ferte haec et dicite lectos
Dardaniae venisse duces socia arma rogantis.'
Obstipuit tanto percussus nomine Pallas:
`Egredere o quicumque es' ait `coramque parentem
adloquere ac nostris succede Penatibus hospes.'
excepitque manu dextramque amplexus inhaesit.

How has Virgil characterised both Pallas and Aeneas in these lines to display their heroic qualities? (5 marks)