Reader Response to the Aeneid

Aeneid
It is strange but certainly not a coincidence that in Virgil's Aeneid only the god and goddesses make use of disguises, masks and tricks for their own purpose and use. Of all the disguises and tricks that are observed in the Aeneid, three of them (Venus disguise as a Tyrian girl, the Trojan horse and two snakes) stand out and reveal what lies beneath a man's journey toward his destiny. There is a sub plot behind Aeneas's struggle to find his destined new civilization. That sub plot reveals inter conflict in the heavens. It is obvious in this epic, and other Homeric epics that the humans are puppets to the arrogant and omnipotent gods. The mortals are victims of a struggle between the goddesses Venus, Juno and Minerva. It is in their battles against each other that we notice how through their disguises each god attacks and counter attacks one another. …