The Epic Similes of "Os Lusiadas"

Abstract

A N EXAMINATION OF THE US S to which the epic simile is put by a Renaissance poet is a surprisingly accurate gauge of his reliance on either the Homeric or Virgilian epic traditions. The poems of Homer celebrate the grandeur of a warrior-hero, are primarily concerned with heroic action, and their extended similes typically serve the function of illuminating the immediate context and little else: though celebrating Christian rather than pagan heroism, Tasso's Ii Gerusalemme Liberata is essentially an Homeric epic, and its similes do little more than Homer's. By contrast, the Aeneid of Virgil celebrates the grandeur of a moral hero, aims at creating a serious philosophical theme out of heroic action, and its epic comparisons function in two different ways: those which primarily illustrate the poem's action operate like Homer's similes, but those which depict Aeneas, Dido and Turnus serve the purpose of reflecting, in a complex fashion, the poem's moral theme. Os Lusiadas is a Virgilian epic and its extended comparisons attest to this fact.