Home1815 Edition

PALINURUS

Volume 15 · 137 words · 1815 Edition

in Fabulous History, Aeneas's pilot, whose fate Virgil very particularly describes. He fell into the sea when asleep; and was three days exposed to the tempests and its agitation, and at last came safe ashore, when the cruel inhabitants of the place murdered him to get his clothes. His body was left unburied on the sea shore: and since, according to the religion of the old Romans, no one could cross the Stygian lake before 100 years were elapsed, if his remains had not been decently buried, we find Aeneas, when he went down to hell, speaking to Palinurus, and assuring him, that though his bones were deprived of a funeral, yet the place where his body was exposed should soon be adorned with a monument, and bear his name; and accordingly a promontory was called Palinurus.