Examples Of Heroism In The Aeneid

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Heroism is a characteristic everyone wants to embody. Aeneas, the main character in Virgil’s Aeneid, demonstrates heroism throughout the epic. The passage in which Aeneas finds the golden bough and throughout his pilgrimage into the underworld is the beginning of Aeneas’ heroic journey. It is a pivotal moment when Aeneas truly embraces his destiny and embodies the heroism he needs to fight for himself and his people.
This passage is important to the Aeneid as a whole because it is the explanation of how Aeneas is able to travel to the underworld and what he encounters when he first arrives. This specific passage is the beginning of the journey for Aeneas. The Aeneid is written in two parts, the journey and the war. This passage is essential because it is the beginning of the end of Aeneas’ journey and he accepts his destined path. It displays a shift in Aeneas’ character. The epic transitions form the journey of its hero to the fighting of the war that benefits the people and the hero.
This marks the start of his destined …show more content…

“Aeneas seized it at once, and though the bough hesitated, he broke it off eagerly and brought it safely back beneath Sibyl’s roof.” (265-267). Aeneas was able to break off the golden bough, that is a sign that he is destined to travel to the underworld, because it is said that if you were not meant to go to the underworld the bough would be impossible to break off. This is showing that Aeneas is destined to travel to the underworld, which proves he is a hero because few have ever traveled to the underworld alive and came out.
The underworld for the ancient Greeks was a world not to be violated. Anyone who went to the underworld knew there was no return. Greek history highlights people who travel to the underworld and come back afterwards. Hercules, Odysseus, Orpheus and the god Hermes are four examples of Greek figures who have traveled to the underworld and

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