This commentary began in 1967, but most of the period from 1971 to 1996 was spent on work that was in some sense an essential preliminary to a detailed study of Aeneid 7 . The work aims to serve as a guide to work on Virgilian language, grammar, syntax and style. Approaches to the text have been, where possible, taken into account, with sympathy but without jargon. Virgil’s sources, in verse and prose, have been studied with special care and the commentary presents a coherent approach to Virgil’s view of Italian religion, antiques and topoghraphy. Unusually full indexing is intended to further the book’s use as a guide to many aspects of Augustan poet idiom.