Blackwell Reference Online

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More than any men known to us, the Romans love their city and strive to protect all their ancestral treasures so that nothing of Rome's ancient glory will be obliterated…. [Even in the wake of the recent siege and occupation by the Goths] they preserved the city's buildings and such adornments as could withstand a long lapse of time, and all such memorials of their race, among them the ship of Aeneas, the founder of the city, a quite incredible sight: for they built a ship-house in the middle of the city on the bank of the Tiber and deposited it there, and have preserved it from that time. I have seen it myself and can describe it…. None of its timbers has rotted or gives the least sign of being unsound; intact throughout, as if newly constructed by the hand of its builder - whoever he was - it has retained its strength in a marvellous way up to my own time. Such are the facts about Aeneas' ship.(Procop. Goth. 8.22.3–17 [abbreviated])Writing this passage in the mid-sixth century ce, Procopius is a striking witness to the depth of the Romans' concern for their national past - and also to the wishfulness, or credulity, of an antique writer's report of it: ancient chronographers placed Aeneas's voyage to Italy around 1200 bce, which would make the pristine nautical relic Procopius saw - had it been genuine - over eighteen hundred years old. An “incredible sight,” indeed - but perhaps ... log in or subscribe to read full text