The Beast Within: Lucan’s Lion (1.205ff.) and his Achillean Caesar

Charlie R. Harper (Florida State University)

In ancient epic, the animal simile is a powerful and effective vehicle for bringing to life an otherwise static, two-dimensional character (Steele 1918). By utilizing the features and behavior of animals, both marvelous and terrible, authors paint profoundly meaningful portraits of their characters. Of all beasts, the lion is the most potent and heroic. Appearing in over fifty similes in Homer and in numerous Latin authors, the lion’s fierce roar, bloodied jaws, and piercing claws heighten the ferocity of battle and the boldness of the epic heroes (Lonsdale 1990).

In Lucan’s Bellum Civile, Caesar is portrayed as such a beast (1.205ff.). Having just now fixed on crossing the Rubicon, Caesar is depicted as an aggressive Libyan lion, pursued by hunters. Lucan’s text, by and large, follows other epic Latin similes in its description of the lion (e.g. Aeneid 12.4ff.). However, there is one glaring irregularity. Lucan reveals that the lion uses its tail to arouse its anger. In extant Latin literature, such a characteristic appears elsewhere only in Catullus (63.81) and Pliny (NH 8.21ff.), neither of which fits the epic context of Lucan’s Bellum Civile. The Iliad (20.164ff.), however, contains an analogous portrayal of the lion’s tail in a simile describing Achilles: both texts peculiarly depict the lion’s tail as a whip with which the lion lashes its sides. In addition to this eye-catching similarity, Lucan’s simile occurs in a context which is strikingly parallel to Homer’s.

Both the Lucanian simile and the Homeric antecedent hinge on the thin divide between fate and freewill; each marks the moment at which Caesar and Achilles throw caution to the wind and hand the reigns to fate. For Achilles stands in no-man’s-land preparing to conclude his self-imposed exile and enter battle, while Caesar stands by the Rubicon preparing to end his postponement and commence civil war. Here, the Rubicon is fittingly termed a certus limes (1.215f.; Green 1991; Masters 1991). Like the inhospitable land which stands between Achilles and Troy, the swollen Rubicon divides Caesar from Rome. The end result of each hero’s decision to cross the boundary before him is predetermined by fate: death. Lucan alludes to this destined outcome by ending the simile with the phrase per ferrum . . . exit (1.212). Although this literally means, “the lion passes along the sword,” one can extract a more sinister meaning, produced by Lucan’s evocative use of the verb exire: “he dies by the sword.” As the beginning of the simile marks Caesar’s resolution to bring war to Italy, so the conclusion of the simile marks the result of that choice.

In order to characterize Caesar as an ill-fated, Achilles-like figure, then, Lucan consciously used Iliad 20.164ff. as his model. Viewed through this Homeric lens, Caesar’s viciousness and rage resultantly make better sense. Caesar is Lucan’s Achilles and his actions, such as allowing the dead to rot after Pharsalia, can be compared to Achilles’, such as his treatment of Hector’s body (Green 1991). Amusingly, this reading also explains a moment of humor. After Pharsalia, Caesar visits Troy (9.975ff.). Stepping on the grave of Hector and the altar of Zeus Herceos, he is rebuked by his guide. Rather than showing Caesar’s naïveté, this scene also implicitly links him to Achilles. Caesar, the new Achilles, is now treading on his nemesis’ grave and the altar of the household, which he helped to overthrow. Just as Achilles was the primary force that brought Troy to its knees, so too Lucan’s Caesar, the new Achilles, lays waste to Rome, the new Troy (Ahl 1976).