Ânteros e Némesis na aula de Vénus

Abstract

While Homer, Virgil and Camões, subject to vast, erudite and detalied commentaries, have had thei use of mythology explained and interpreted from early times, a Portuguese poet who was once favourably compared to all of them, Jerónimo Corte-Real, lacked any such exegesis. The lecture on mythology that Venus gives to her son Amor in the poem 'Sepúlveda', completed by his and his brother Anteros's journey to the dwellings of Nemesis, is one of the occurrences which create the most difficulty to historical-philological commentary, because of the differences it establishes with respect to classical tradition. The present paper is intended as a brief introduction to an issue which has not so far been approached by studies on the great Portuguese poetry of the 16th century.