Eneados

The Eneados (Laitin Aeneis, pronounced |ajˈneːis|—the teetle is Greek in form: genitive case Aeneidos) is an epic poem written by Vergil atween 29 an 19 BC. It tells the story o Aeneas. It stairts wi Aeneas cairyin his faither Anchises oot o the burnin Troy. It ends wi Aeneas laundin on the shores o Italy, fechtin agin the hamelt indwallers thare.

Aeneas flees burning Troy, Federico Barocci, 1598 Galleria Borghese, Rome

Scots translate

The first translation o the poem intae Scots wis the owersettin by Gavin Douglas, feenisht in 1513. It is the first hail an aefauld randerin o owersettin o ony major wark o classical antiquity intae an Anglic leid. In addeetion tae Douglas's version o the text o the Aeneid, the wark haes a translation o the "thirteent beuk" an aw. It is written by the fifteent-century makar Maffeo Vegio as a continuation o the Aeneid; an oreeginal prologue for ilka o the thirteen beuks; a series o concludin poems; an a unfeenished commentary, kivverin anerly pairt o the first beuk, written as marginal notes (awmaist siccarly in Douglas's ain haund) in the Cambridge manuscript.

Even in the 20t century, Ezra Pound conseedered this still tae be the best Aeneid translation, ruisin the "richness and fervour" o its langage an its seegnatur lealty tae the oreeginal. The Inglis owerset by the 17t-century poet John Dryden is anither important varsion that can be said tae hauden on tae the pouer an flowe o the oreeginal. Maist classic owersettins, includin baith Douglas an Dryden, employed a rhyme scheme, that wis no Roman convention an isna for ordinar follaed in modren versions.

In the first general prologue, Douglas compares the merits o Virgil an Chaucer as maister makars an attacks Caxton for his scrimpit randerin o a French translate o the Aeneid.

Sample

Here is a swatch o Douglas' pit ower o the appenin o the poem wi his oreeginal spellin:

The batalis and the man I wil discrive,

Fra Troys boundis first that fugitive

By fait to Ytail come and cost Lavyne ;

Our land and sey kachit with mekil pyne,

By fors of goddis abuse, from euery steid,

Of cruell Juno throu ald remembrit fede.

Gret pane in batail sufferit he alsso,

Or he his goddis brocht in Latio,

And belt the cite, fra quham, of nobill fame,

The Latyne pepill takyn heth thar name,

And eik the faderis, princis of Alba,

Cam, and the wallaris of gret Rome alswa.

External links

• Online reproduction of the Bannatyne Club edition: vol. 1, vol. 2
• Translation as Creative Retelling: Constituents, Patterning and Shift in Gavin Douglas' Eneados, Ph.D. thesis by Gordon McGregor Kendal, 2008
• Downloadable modernization (Modern Scots) Archived 2013-01-23 at the Wayback Machine by John Law