Note 71 — Chapter IV · THE HELLESPONT AND HOMER’S TROY
Reading edition
According to Suetonius and Horace both Julius Cæsar and Augustus, like Constantine the Great, contemplated making Ilium—Troy—the capital of the Roman Empire.
Lucan not only makes Julius visit the Ilium of his day and “each story’d place survey”—
Circuit exustæ nomen memorabile Trojae—
but also has him register a solemn vow to restore Priam’s city to its ancient state and honors—
Restituam populos, grata vice mœnia reddent Ausomidæ Phrygibus, Romanaque Pergama surgent.
So proud, indeed, were the Romans of Ilium and of their descent from Æneas that their countrymen, under the command of Cornelius Scipio Asiaticus, on getting their first view of the home of their forefathers from the Trojan shore, were so moved, Virgil informs us, that they exultingly exclaimed:
O patria, O divom domus Ilium et incluta bello Mœnia Dardanidum!
“The dignity and power of Ilium being thus prodigiously enhanced we must find it but natural,” observes Grote, “that the Ileans assumed to themselves exaggerated importance as the recognized parents of all conquering Rome.” History of Greece, Vol. I, p. 328.