Horses in the Tempest: the Shape(s) of the Winds in Aeneid Book 1

This article discusses the horse imagery related to the winds in the storm episode at the beginning of Virgil’s Aeneid. A close analysis of Aen. 1.50–86 brings to light the pervasiveness of this imagery, only partly noticed by scholars, who have regarded it as metaphorical (§1). It is here suggested that the winds released by Aeolus could instead be considered as real horses. A reassessment of the ancient literary—and, briefly, iconographic—evidence of the depiction of the winds as horses, horsemen or charioteers is proposed; Virgil fits into a longstanding tradition of Homeric ancestry, which represents the winds as horses (§2). This allows a better understanding of the narrative dynamic which in Aeneid 1 opposes Aeolus to Neptune, the god of the sea as well as of the horses; moreover, the equestrian (and circus) imagery evoked by Virgil contributes to the political and cosmic significance of the tempest episode (§3).