Rape, Apotheosis, and Politics in Metamorphoses 14 and 15

Abstract

Abstract:This paper examines apotheoses that occur in the last two books of Ovid’s Metamorphoses and argues that they are modeled after previous rapes from the poem. In the apotheosis of Julius Caesar, Ovid uses rapina to mean “deification,” a word only used elsewhere in the poem with the definition of “rape.” Similar language of snatching also occurs in the deification of Romulus. Aeneas’s apotheosis parallels rape through its evocation of nympholepsy. By insinuating that apotheosis is rape, Ovid seems to be commenting on the politicization of both rape and apotheosis in Roman mythmaking, especially for political reasons.