[579] Suspectus occurs again 9. 530, where we hear of a tower “vasto suspectu.” ‘Caeli suspectus’ evidently means the looking up to heaven, ‘ad aetherium Olympum’ being added to develope the thought. The meaning then will be that the gulf of Tartarus extends twice as far below the ground of the infernal regions which Aeneas and the Sibyl are traversing, as the heaven extends above the earth. To this explanation we are helped by the words of Hom. quoted on v. 577. We should have expected some mention of the earth, but Virg., writing with Hom. and Lucr. in his mind, was perhaps less likely to cultivate perfect clearness of expression, and he doubtless intended ‘suspectus’ to be pressed, the earth being the only place from which a person could look up to heaven. This seems more likely than the view apparently held by Donatus and glanced at by Heyne, which would make the meaning to be that the depth of Tartarus below the infernal plains is as great as the height of heaven viewed, if it could be viewed, from the infernal plains; though there would be nothing harsh in thus slurring over ‘suspectus,’ if we did not suppose Virg. to have the parallel of Hom. in his mind. Comp. G. 1. 243 (note), where ‘videt’ is used as loosely as ‘suspectus’ would be according to this interpretation. A third view is mentioned by Forb. as Henry's, who however does not give it in his own note on this passage, viz. that ‘caeli suspectus’ means the looking up from the floor of the sky to the highest point of Olympus, which he supposes to be meant by “vertice caeli” 1. 225. This view also would have much to recommend it, introducing as it does a striking comparison between the heights of heaven and the depths of the shades, but for the parallel in Hom. Petit ingeniously proposed to substitute ‘terra’ for ‘caeli’ here, introducing ‘caeli’ for ‘Terrae’ in the next verse. Ladewig, following some of the older commentators, connects ‘caeli Olympus,’ supposing it to be so called to distinguish it from the mountain in Thessaly.
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John Conington. P. Vergili Maronis opera. P. Vergili Maronis Opera. The works of Virgil, with a Commentary by John Conington, M.A. Late Corpus Professor of Latin in the University of Oxford. London. Whittaker and Co., Ave Maria Lane. 1876.
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