Baptizing the Bees: Vergilian Allegory in Confessions 9.10

Abstract

This thesis examines how Augustine forms intertextual links between Vergil’s Georgics 4 and his Confessions 9.10. Both texts employ themes of katabasis, sacrifice, rebirth, perfect society, and didactic heroism, which enables Augustine to intertextually lift Vergil’s text out of its original context and into a new Christianizing and Neoplatonic context. To understand how Augustine forms this intertext, I begin the thesis by developing a theory of intertextuality which compares the process of intertextuality to allegorical interpretation. I next consider the role Augustine gives to Vergil’s Georgics 4 in Confessions 10, where Augustine prominently makes allusion to the Vergilian text. Although textual allusion to Vergil is not a prominent feature in Confessions 9.10, I argue that the scene in Confessions 9.10 is structurally and thematically similar to Augustine’s treatment in Confessions 10. The thesis concludes by considering how Confessions 9.10 plays on the themes found in Georgics 4, and how Augustine is able to assert his own perspective onto Vergil’s text by placing it into a Christian context.