April 10, 2004
The famous poet and story teller from the north, not getting any younger, seeks warmer climes. He arrives in the town by the sea, writes some poems about farming, then dies. Big Yawn! Let's give it to the boys in rewrite. Tell 'em to punch it up a bit. So the rewrite crew, better known as the Medieval Mythmakers, takes the basic outline and cooks up their own version. Which goes something like this -
Long ago, in some Un-United Kingdom far to the west, a Druid magician and astrologer bedded the goddess Maia, or maybe one of her descendants, who soon gave birth to a son. (In an example of dueling myths, some versions even state Maia was a virgin.) It's said that on the day of his birth the ground under Rome shook. Perhaps looking far into the future and getting hooked on television westerns, Dad decided to call the boy Virgil. His parents initiated him into the mystical arts and, at the age of 14, he was sent off to a deserted temple to wait for visions. He was about to get a little shut-eye his first night when something told him to look under the rock he was going to use as a pillow. He uncovered an urn and pulled the stopper, releasing a demon, a beautiful female demon, who gave him a book of spells and a magic wand. And he was off to Hogwarts. No, that was another wizard; he was off east, to Rome.
He spent the first part of his life in the Italian capital, tossing off poetry and the occasional enchantment. Tourists can see the results of one of the latter in Rome today, the Bocca della Verita or Mouth of Truth. One wall at the Church of Santa Maria, contains a large face with a gaping mouth. You place your hand into the mouth. If you are telling the truth you will be unharmed; if there's a lie in your heart or on your lips the mouth snaps shut on your hand. I'm not making this up; ask any tour guide.
After writing the Aeneid Virgil did head south. Traveling down Italy's west coast he eventually came upon the city of Parthenope. Perched between a mountain and a wide, sweeping bay, the city's beauty worked its spell on the magician and he settled in, an early snowbird. There were many other newcomers to the area and it soon became necessary to start a suburb. Which quickly outgrew it's parent and was given the name Neapolis. Later it was decided that 'Naples' was easier to spell.
Virgil, falling in love with the sunny south, decided to make Naples his final dwelling place, but also felt that some home insurance wouldn't be a bad idea. Home-made, of course. Easter hadn't been invented yet, but the far-seeing magician decided to color an egg. Summoning up an ostrich egg, he colored half yellow, with an image of the sun on it, and the rest blue, bearing the symbol of the moon. He then said some magic words and proceeded to carry the egg around the walls of the entire city. Afterwards he passed the egg through vapors from burning sulfur as he intoned: "Though many live and die, the Egg remains, The twofold Egg that turns through night and day. Its shell contains the Force of Life within, Protected from the Chaos that surrounds. So also this our home shall be secure, However long the Egg is kept intact."
He then placed the egg in a cage supported by four pillars, symbolizing the four elements (This made for a very simple Periodic Table). The resulting structure was placed in a hole in the ground and a fortress was built over it. On an egg-shaped floor plan for extra insurance. It must have worked. Go to Naples today and you'll be shown the prison called Castello dell'Ovo, or Castle of the Egg.
Script 358
(c) 2004 David Minor / Eagles Byte
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