Kenney_and_Clausen B.M.W.(eds.) - Get a Free Blog

LUCAN
proves right: he remains outside it, unscathed. 1 Nature's role and that of the
hero have been interchanged: so much so, that the turmoil is no menace to
Caesar, rather a measure of his demonic genius:
credit iam digna pericula Caesar
fads esse suis (5.653—4)
he considers at last that the danger is on a scale to match his destiny.
No deity began the storm. It was Caesar who wanted to sail, despite the protests
of the humble Amyclas. And it is almost as if it has been he who has directed
the storm, not the gods or nature, when the tenth wave, which normally
brings destruction, places him and his boat on dry land:
haec fatum decimus, dictu mirabile, fluctus
inualida cum puppe leuat, nee rursus ab alto
aggere deiecit pelagi sed protulit unda,
scruposisque angusta uacant ubi litora saxis,
imposuit terrae. (5.672-6)
As he spoke thus, a tenth wave — marvellous to tell — upbore him and his battered
crafty nor did the billow hurl him back again from the high watery crest but bore him
onwards till it laid him on the land, where a narrow strip of shore was clear of jagged
rocks. 2
What Lucan forgets to tell us is that the mission was a failure: for Caesar,
who thrives on disorder, has risen superior to a world he has ruined.
1
Lucan defers to tradition at 639 and 652—3, where sailors experience fear: but these nautae are
generalized. The magister of 645 whose ars is defeated by metus is probably Amyclas, Caesar's
humble companion. But he is an ordinary mortal, not a superman. Lucan continues the notion of a
storm which cannot harm the usually helpless hero at 646, with discorJia ponti \ succurrit miserts: the
last word is out of place, but Lucan nods on occasion, even given his own terms of reference.
1
For the tenth wave, see Ov. Met. 11.5 30, Trist. 1.1.49—50. Lucan is thinking of Odyssey 5, -where
the hero was finally washed ashore by a 'great wave': but he had first been wrecked by a u4ya uOpa
.. . 8eiv6v STTKTOOIMVOV (U. 313—14): cf. ingots ... pontus at Virg. Aen. 1.114. Caesar has }ust reversed
another convention of the poetica tempestas, in his contempt for the thought of death, 656—71
(especially 668—9 mihi funere nullo | cst opus, o superi): other epic heroes had trembled at the idea of
lacking a proper burial. See Morford (1967) 44.
557
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