I. 3-5 secondary sources or theoretical works
Fulton, Helen. “Origins and Introductions: Troy and Rome in Medieval British and Irish Writing” in Celts, Romans, Britons: Classical and Celtic Influence in the Construction of British Identities, edited by Francesca Kaminski-Jones and Rhys Kaminski-Jones, Classical Presences, Oxford, 2020; https://doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780198863076.003.0004
Hardie, Philip. The Last Trojan Hero: A Cultural History of Virgil’s Aeneid, London, I.B. Tauris, 2014.
Pocock, J. G. A. “The historiography of the translatio imperii’ in Barbarism and Religion, 2003, pp. 127–150. https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511490675.009
Quint, David. Epic and Empire: Politics and Generic Form from Virgil to Milton. Princeton University Press, 2021.
Rajsic, Jaclyn. “The Brut: Legendary British History” in Medieval Historical Writing: Britain and Ireland, 500–1500; edited by Jennifer Jahner, Emily Steiner, and Elizabeth M. Tyler, pp. 67-84, 2019.
II. One academic journal
Journal Vergilius, published by The Vergilian Society. Accessed at https://www-jstor-org.dickinson.idm.oclc.org/journal/vergilius1959
III. 1-3 key words
epic, heroes, translatio imperii
IV. Accompanying essay
For my thesis, I want to focus on how literature has shaped empires, specifically how many empires have established a Trojan descendance to create a national identity that’s based on a manipulated mythos. By hijacking this story of the Trojan War and manipulating it to their literary needs, authors have made these historical losers into the fathers of empire, whether the Romans, English, or Franks. Right now, my ideas and choices for primary texts are a bit far reaching, so I’d like to explore options and narrow down to what provides the most for close reading.
In most cases, the Trojan ancestor is a refugee, fleeing from the fall of Troy and looking to establish a new home, a new Troy. The ancestor is usually a heroic figure (like Aeneas or Brutus) and has a clear value and moral system that reflects what is important to each culture. Furthermore, it may be interesting to see how these texts juxtapose the Trojan hero and his values with the ‘local’ peoples as a way to justify further colonization and empire. Right now, all I know is I want to look at these stories and their connection to Troy and understand why authors did this, and the impact it had on the larger conception of each ‘nation.’
For this reading list, I first spoke with Professor Mastrangelo. We mainly talked about The Aeneid, but he recommended two secondary texts of scholarship (Philip Hardie and David Quint) that explore how epic and empire are intertwined. Understandably, we mostly talked about The Aeneid and the ways it works to make Aeneas the model Roman, as well as someone quintessentially non-Greek. I then spoke with Professor Kersh to confirm that this was a good route of inquiry, and I finally spoke with Professor Skalak, who really pushed me in the medieval route and introduced me to the term translatio imperii, or the medieval concept that the authority of empires is translated from one to another, creating a sort of lineage for the transfer of power.
I originally thought of exploring the Brutus story in Geoffrey of Monmouth, but Professor Skalak recommended Layamon’s Brut, which is an English version of the story. I’m having trouble finding a translation of it from Middle English, but I put an academic article about it on my list to learn more. She also recommended looking at ‘Trojan sections’ of Gawain and the Green Knight and Le Morte D’Arthur, which were highly influential in the period. I’m hoping to get a more basic overview of the period and then decide where to dive in.
My main questions will be: What was translatio imperii? How popular and influential was the idea? Why was Troy chosen specifically as the ‘original’ empire? Why make the ‘losers’ into your ancestors? How did having precedent/ancestry give authority to an empire? What’s the significance of this ‘national literature’ making these connections?