Love and war

 Eclogue 10 provides a suitable opportunity to comment on the love and war motif prevalent in classical literature.  Love famously vincit(s) all(69).  Such a term befits the battlefield, yet can also apply to the bedroom.  Earlier in the poem, Gallus is separated from his love because of an amor for Mars(44).  What befits the bedroom can also apply to the battlefield.  Both phenomena are linked by the need of intense passion.

I turn to the mythological connection between the two: Ares and Aphrodite.  Since I am teaching Heroes this semester, I have recently read the Iliad again and what really stuck out to me this time around is that Diomedes is able to wound Ares.  He wounds Aphrodite, but that is not so radical.  She is a god, but she is the love god.  She does not belong there.  But Ares? He is the god of war!  Even with Athena’s assistance, it is impressive.  Especially since Diomedes is rebuffed by Apollo.  I think that I am ranting here, so that I would like to touch upon my point that both deities are subject to passion and are vulnerable as a result.  (As an aside, I assume that everyone here is familiar enough with the myths, so that I do not have to narrate their affair.)  The lover and the fighter fit so well together because they are both willing to let themselves be entirely overcome with emotions.  

For those unfamiliar with the work, I highly recommend Ovid’s take on this motif, in Amores 1.1. and 1.9 (he may play with it more, but my cognitive faculties are limited at the present). There are, of course, other works which play on this motif. I guess that I simply wanted to use this post to air out that thought.