Ripheus (also Rhipeus, Rifeo and Rupheo) was a Trojan hero and the name of a figure from the ''

Aeneid The ''Aeneid'' ( ; la, Aenē̆is or ) is a Latin epic poem, written by Virgil between 29 and 19 BC, that tells the legendary story of Aeneas, a Trojan who fled the fall of Troy and travelled to Italy, where he became the ancestor of ...

'' 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: th ...

. A comrade of

Aeneas In Greco-Roman mythology, Aeneas (, ; from ) was a Trojan hero, the son of the Trojan prince Anchises and the Greek goddess Aphrodite (equivalent to the Roman Venus). His father was a first cousin of King Priam of Troy (both being grandsons ...

, he was a Trojan who was killed defending his city against the

Greeks The Greeks or Hellenes (; el, Έλληνες, ''Éllines'' ) are an ethnic group and nation indigenous to the Eastern Mediterranean and the Black Sea regions, namely Greece, Cyprus, Albania, Italy, Turkey, Egypt, and, to a lesser extent, ot ...

. "Ripheus also fell," Virgil writes, "uniquely the most just of all the Trojans, the most faithful preserver of equity; but the gods decided otherwise" (Virgil, ''Aeneid'' II, 426–8). Ripheus's righteousness was not rewarded by the gods.

Ripheus in later works

Dante

In his ''

Divine Comedy The ''Divine Comedy'' ( it, Divina Commedia ) is an Italian narrative poem by Dante Alighieri, begun 1308 and completed in around 1321, shortly before the author's death. It is widely considered the pre-eminent work in Italian literature a ...

'',

Dante Dante Alighieri (; – 14 September 1321), probably baptized Durante di Alighiero degli Alighieri and often referred to as Dante (, ), was an Italian poet, writer and philosopher. His ''Divine Comedy'', originally called (modern Italian: ' ...

placed Ripheus in Heaven, in the sixth sphere of

Jupiter Jupiter is the fifth planet from the Sun and the largest in the Solar System. It is a gas giant with a mass more than two and a half times that of all the other planets in the Solar System combined, but slightly less than one-thousand ...

, the realm of those who personified

justice Justice, in its broadest sense, is the principle that people receive that which they deserve, with the interpretation of what then constitutes "deserving" being impacted upon by numerous fields, with many differing viewpoints and perspective ...

. Here, he provides an interesting foil to Virgil himself—whom Dante places in the first circle of Hell, with the pagans and the unbaptized—even though Virgil is a major character in the ''Commedia'' and for much of it remains Dante's guide through Hell and Purgatory. Although Ripheus would historically have been a pagan, in Dante's work he is portrayed as having been given a vision of Jesus over a thousand years before Christ's first coming, and was thus converted to Christianity in the midst of the Trojan War.

Boccaccio

In Boccaccio's '' Il Filostrato'' (1333–1339), Ripheus is named as one of the Trojans taken prisoner by the Greeks.

Chaucer

''Il Filostrato'' served as the basis for

Chaucer Geoffrey Chaucer (; – 25 October 1400) was an English poet, author, and civil servant best known for '' The Canterbury Tales''. He has been called the "father of English literature", or, alternatively, the "father of English poetry". He w ...

's '' Troilus and Criseyde''. In it, Ripheo is mentioned as being unable to prevent Antenor from being taken prisoner. As ''Rupheo'', he appears once, in final rhyming position.

João de Barros

João de Barros, who later became one of the main Portuguese historians of the 16th century, while still a young man of the court of King Manuel, wrote a chivalry romanche called ''A Chronica do Emperador Clarimundo'' (''The Chronicle of Emperor Clarimundo''), in which it is reported that Tróia, Portugal was founded by a Trojan called Ripheus (in 16th-century Portuguese ''Riphane''), who escaped the destruction of his city with the group of

, from which it split, and moved across the Mediterranean and into the Atlantic until reaching the Setúbal Peninsula. There, Ripheus/Riphane's group engaged in a war with a party of Greeks led by Ulysses that established itself in what now is Lisbon, on the opposite side of the Tagus river. This 'transplanted' Greek-Trojan war continued for some generations after the death of this Ripheus.''Chronica do Emperador Clarimundo'', page
396404
(16th-century Portuguese) It is unclear if this Ripheus/Riphane is the same as the one of Virgil, and the authors previously referred to, or just a similarly named Trojan countryman of the most famous Ripheus (the fact that de Barros makes no clear references to the known deeds of the Trojan war past of Ripheus in his book and that in the original myth Ripheus fell in the Greek conquest of the town seems to go against it, but possibly de Barros is basing himself in the Boccaccio tradition of Ripheus having been taken as prisoner by the Greeks having possibly escaped subsequently, and the fact that de Barros refers to Riphane as being morally impressive seem to make an identification of Riphane and Ripheus possible. It could be also debated that post-classical versions of myths making characters dead in the Trojan War survive after it is not unusual, being also told about Hector's son Astyanax to make him survive to found the ancient Gauls and Franks).

Namesake

Jovian asteroid 188847 Rhipeus, discovered at the Calvin–Rehoboth Observatory in 2006, was named after the Trojan warrior. The official was published by the Minor Planet Center on 19 August 2008 ().

References

External links

Dante Index

{{Aeneid Trojans Characters in the Aeneid