Virgil

Virgil (70–19 BC) was born near Mantua in northern Italy and studied rhetoric and philosophy in Rome before turning to poetry. His pastoral Eclogues (42–37 BC) and the four books of the Georgics, on farming (29 BC), established his reputation; the last decade of his life was given to the Aeneid, the national epic of Rome, which he left unfinished at his death. Tradition holds he wanted the manuscript destroyed; the emperor Augustus overruled him and had it published.