Underworld- Roman LocationLocation · Realm"Kingdom of the Dead"

The Geography

Virgil's Aeneid maps the underworld as a journey downward. Past the cave at Avernus and the ferryman's crossing, the road enters the regions where the dead are sorted. The Mourning Fields hold those who died of love. The warriors' ground holds those who fell in battle. Then the path forks: right to Elysium, left to Tartarus. At the fork stands the palace of Pluto.

The Mourning Fields

In the Mourning Fields, Aeneas found Dido among the myrtle groves. She had killed herself after he left Carthage. He wept when he saw her and swore the gods had forced him to leave. She would not look at him. She turned and walked back to her first husband Sychaeus without a word. Virgil says her face was as unmoved as flint.

Nearby, the warriors who fell at Troy still wore their wounds. Trojan heroes crowded around Aeneas in welcome. Greek enemies fled at the sight of him.

Tartarus

The left-hand path descended to Tartarus, surrounded by the Phlegethon's fire and enclosed by triple walls. A massive iron tower rose at its center. Tisiphone the Fury guarded the gate, sleepless, armed with a whip.

Rhadamanthus judged the dead within, forcing confessions. Tityos lay stretched across nine acres while vultures consumed his regenerating liver. Tantalus reached for food and water that drew back at his touch.

The Mundus and the Lacus Curtius

Romans maintained openings to the underworld in the city itself. The Mundus was a ritual pit in the heart of Rome, covered by a stone. Three times each year, on August 24, October 5, and November 8, the stone was lifted and the boundary between living and dead stood open. Macrobius and Varro record that on these days no public business could be conducted. The spirits walked freely.

The Lacus Curtius in the Forum bore its own underworld connection. A chasm had once opened in the earth there, and the young soldier Marcus Curtius, told that Rome must sacrifice its greatest strength, leaped in fully armed on horseback. The earth closed over him. Livy records the story as an act of devotio, self-sacrifice to the powers below.