In Virgil’s Aeneid, Aeneas is the Trojan hero who becomes Rome’s legendary ancestor.
Aeneas escapes the destroyed city of Troy with his father Anchises and son Ascanius. After years of wandering and conflict, he reaches Italy, where his descendants are connected to the future foundation of Rome. The epic therefore links Trojan mythology with Roman national identity.
Virgil wrote the Aeneid in Latin during the late first century BCE. The poem was left unfinished at his death in 19 BCE, but it became one of the central works of Latin literature. Its opening follows Aeneas after the fall of Troy, while its later books focus on war in Italy, especially his conflict with Turnus.
Aeneas is not the same figure as Hector, Troy’s great defender, or Paris, whose actions help trigger the Trojan War. In Roman tradition, Aeneas’s son Ascanius is also called Iulus, from whom the Julian family claimed descent.