Annotations
In the lower right corner, Venus complains to Jupiter about the hardships suffered by Aeneas and the Trojans and begs him to reaffirm his plan for their destiny (223-53). He does so in lines 254-96. In the upper left, Aeneas sits at a table with two men with something laid out in front of them - possibly venison, since there is a pair of antlers by Aeneas. There is a city in the top right corner, probably Carthage. The rest of the image is filled with rolling hills, healthy trees, and a spring flowing into a stream, which give off a sense of abundance. (Katy Purington)
Woodcut illustration from the “Strasbourg Vergil,” edited by Sebastian Brant: Publii Virgilii Maronis Opera cum quinque vulgatis commentariis expolitissimisque figuris atque imaginibus nuper per Sebastianum Brant superadditis (Strasbourg: Johannis Grieninger, 1502), fol. 133r, executed by an anonymous engraver under the direction of Brant.
Sebastian Brant (1458–1521) was a humanist scholar of many competencies. Trained in classics and law at the University of Basel, Brant later lectured in jurisprudence there and practiced law in his native city of Strasbourg. While his satirical poem Das Narrenschiff won him considerable standing as a writer, his role in the transmission of Virgil to the Renaissance was at least as important. In 1502 he and Strasbourg printer Johannes Grüninger produced a major edition of Virgil’s works, along with Donatus’ Life and the commentaries of Servius, Landino, and Calderini, with more than two hundred woodcut illustrations (Annabel Patterson).