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Virgil

Publius Vergilius Maro ("Virgil", 70 - 19 BCE): Roman poet, author of the Aeneid, the national poem of the Romans.

Name: Publius Vergilius Maro; "Virgil" is a common English rendering
Ancient biography: Donatus, Life of Virgil (fourth century CE)
70 BCE: Born in Mantua
Studies in Cremona, Milan, Rome, Naples
44-41 BCE: Civil war after the assassination of Julius Caesar; proscriptions and confiscations; Virgil loses his land but his patron Asinius Pollio makes sure he gets it back
42-39 BCE: Publishes the Eclogues (Shepherds' songs, inspired by Theocritus)
Accepted within the circle of Maecenas and Octavian
39-29 BCE: Lives in Naples, composes the Georgica (poetry about the country life, inspired by Hesiod)
29-19 BCE: Composes the Aeneid (inspired by Homer's Odyssey and Iliad)
19 BCE: Dies in Brindisi before completing the Aeneid

The Aeneid becomes the national poem of the Romans
Commentary: Servius (student of Donatus)
The fourth eclogue, which announces the birth of a special child, was read as a prediction of the birth of Christ, which gave Virgil a special status in the Middle Ages