Aemylia, a lady of high degree, in love with Am'yas, a squire of inferior rank. Going to meet her lover at a trysting-place, she was caught up by a hideous monster, and thrust into his den for future food. Belphoebê (3 syl.) slew "the caitiff" and released the maid (canto vii.). Prince Arthur, having slain Corflambo, released Amyas from the durance of Paea'na, Corflambo's daughter, and brought the lovers together "in peace and joyous blis" (canto ix.).—Spencer, Faëry Queen, iv. (1596).
Aemil'ia, wife of Aege'on the Syracusian merchant, and mother of the twins called Antiph'olus. When the boys were shipwrecked, she was parted from them and taken to Ephesus. Here she entered a convent, and rose to be the abbess. Without her knowing it, one of her twins also settled in Ephesus, and rose to be one of its greatest and richest citizens. The other son and her husband Ægeon both set foot in Ephesus the same day without the knowledge of each other, and all met together in the duke's court, when the story of their lives was told, and they became again united to each other.—Shakespeare, Comedy of Errors (1593).
Aene'as, a Trojan prince, the hero of Virgil's epic called Aeneid. He was the son of Anchi'ses and Venus. His first wife was Creu'sa (3 syl.), by whom he had a son named Asca'nius; his second wife was Lavinia, daughter of Latinus king of Italy, by whom he had a posthumous son called Aene'as Sylvius. He succeeded his father-in-law in the kingdom, and the Romans called him their founder.
According to Geoffrey of Monmouth "Brutus," the first king of Britain (from whom the island was called Britain), was a descendant of Æneas.
Aene'id, the epic poem of Virgil, in twelve books. When Troy was taken by the Greeks and set on fire, Aene'as, with his father, son, and wife, took flight, with the intention of going to Italy, the original birthplace of the family. The wife was lost, and the old father died on the way; but after numerous perils by sea and land, Æneas and his son Asca'nius reached Italy. Here Latïnus, the reigning king, received the exiles hospitably, and promised his daughter Lavin'ia in marriage to Æneas; but she had been already betrothed by her mother to prince Turnus, son of Daunus, king of Ru'tuli, and Turnus would not forego his claim. Latinus, in this dilemma, said the rivals must settle the dispute by an appeal to arms. Turnus being slain, Æneas married Lavinia, and ere long succeeded his father-in-law on the throne.
Book I. The escape from Troy; Æneas and his son, driven by a tempest on the shores of Carthage, are hospitably entertained by queen Dido.
II. Æneas tells Dido the tale of the wooden horse, the burning of Troy, and his flight with his father, wife, and son. The wife was lost and died.
III. The narrative continued. The perils he met with on the way, and the death of his father.
IV. Dido falls in love with Æneas; but he steals away from Carthage, and Dido, on a funeral pyre, puts an end to her life.
V. Æneas reaches Sicily, and celebrates there the games in honor of Anchises. This book corresponds to the Iliad, xxiii.