Umbro is a valorous (''fortissimus'') warrior-priest of the Marruvians that appears in Book 7 of
Virgil
Publius Vergilius Maro (; traditional dates 15 October 7021 September 19 BC), usually called Virgil or Vergil ( ) in English, was an ancient Roman poet of the Augustan period. He composed three of the most famous poems in Latin literature: t ...
's
Aeneid
The ''Aeneid'' ( ; la, Aenē̆is or ) is a Latin Epic poetry, epic poem, written by Virgil between 29 and 19 BC, that tells the legendary story of Aeneas, a Troy, Trojan who fled the Trojan_War#Sack_of_Troy, fall of Troy and travelled to ...
and his role has received significant academic coverage.
[Dinter (2005, p. 167 n30) reports Horsfall (2000) as providing an extensive bibliography on this.] Dinter (2000, p167) reports several interpretation of his role. These include his being a part of the old Italy that needs to die, or on his death the end of a localism that is being replaced by the Trojan's founding of their new empire. He has the power to make snakes sleep but his herbs and hymns cannot save him from the Trojan's spear. Virgil's lamentation for his loss is described as being particularly beautiful and poignant by Parry (1963, p. 66): ''For you the grove of Angitia mourned, and Fucinus' glassy waters, And the clear lakes.'' (''Te nemus Angitiae, vitrea te Fucinus unda, Te Uquidi flevere lacus'').
Notes
Bibliography
* Dinter, M. (2005). Epic and Epigram—Minor Heroes in Virgil’s Aeneid. ''The Classical Quarterly'', 55(1), 153-169.
* Horsfall, Nicholas (2000) ''Virgil, Aeneid 7: A Commentary, Mnemos. bibliotheca classica Batava, Supplementum'' Leiden-Boston- Köln
* Putnam, Michael C. J. (1992) Umbro, Nireus and Love’s Threnody. ''Vergilius'' 38:12-23 pp. 12–23. JSTOR,
* Parry, A. (1963). The Two Voices of Virgil’s “Aeneid.” Arion: A Journal of Humanities and the Classics, 2(4), 66–80.
{{Aeneid
Characters in the Aeneid