Virgil’s Trojan Horse and the Monstrous Birth of Latin Literature

Kachuck, Aaron [UCL]

This paper proceeds in three sections: first, a brief exploration of the Aeneid as a semiotic adventure, a journey towards language, and one in which Horses might, for reasons of history and myth, be expected to play a starring role; second, a close reading of Virgil’s Trojan Horse episode as depicting the monstrosity of Virgilian epic itself; and, third, and last, we will look to how Virgil’s Trojan Horse may invoke the cultural memory of two birth-scences of a literature in Latin: Livius Andronicus’ hymn in 207 BCE, and the re-performance of the Equus Troianus of Livius (or perhaps Naevius) at the celebratory dedication of the Theater of Pompey and the adjoining Temple of Venux Victrix.