Founding of Rome the line of Romans through his son Iulus, the namesake of the Julio-Claudian dynasty. The national epic of mythical Rome, the "Aeneid" of Virgil, tells the story of how Trojan prince Aeneas came to Italy. The "Aeneid" was written under Augustus, who claimed ancestry through Julius Caesar from the hero and his mother Venus. According to the "Aeneid", the survivors from the fallen city of Troy banded together under Aeneas and underwent a series of adventures around the Mediterranean Sea, including a stop at newly founded Carthage under the rule of Queen Dido, eventually reaching the Italian coast. The Trojans
Aeneid on a variety of issues. The tone of the poem as a whole is a particular matter of debate; some see the poem as ultimately pessimistic and politically subversive to the Augustan regime, while others view it as a celebration of the new imperial dynasty. Virgil makes use of the symbolism of the Augustan regime, and some scholars see strong associations between Augustus and Aeneas, the one as founder and the other as re-founder of Rome. A strong teleology, or drive towards a climax, has been detected in the poem. The "Aeneid" is full of prophecies about the future of