The onlooker with his staff, could be Aeneas, a hero of the Trojan Wars who saved his father by carrying over his back ( hence his hunched position, and his Trojan beard ) and who is believed to have founded Rome, and from whom the Julian clan, thus Julius Caesar and Attia, claimed descent, witnessing the conception of Rome's future savior as an Empire, and the greatest of all the Emperors.

The family leaves the home, Aeneas carrying his father and Iulus holding his hand, while Creusa is to remain some distance behind them.

Aeneas carrying Anchises, with Ascanius and his wife, red-figure amphora from a Greek workshop in Etruria, ca.

The name Procas or Proca may be related to the mythological figure Prochyte, a kinswoman of Aeneas who died when the fleet carrying the refugees of Troy to Italy was within sight of the coast.

Glimpses are recorded of the fallen city, walls burning, looting and destruction and a fleeing populace including Aeneas, carrying his father Anchises away from the scene of devastation and unknowingly in to a new and glorious future on alien shores.

In Greco-Roman mythology, Aeneas (; Greek:, Aineías, derived from Greek meaning " to praise ") was a Trojan hero, the son of the prince Anchises and the goddess Aphrodite.

The Aeneads included Aeneas ' trumpeter Misenus, his father Anchises, his friends Achates, Sergestus and Acmon, the healer Iapyx, the helmsman Palinurus, and his son Ascanius ( also known as Iulus, Julus, or Ascanius Julius ).

" Virgil, in the Aeneid, has Aeneas ' father Anchises mention Fabius Maximus while in Hades as the greatest of the many great Fabii, quoting the same line.

Aeneas leads a group of survivors away from the city, among them his son Ascanius ( also known as Iulus ), his trumpeter Misenus, father Anchises, the healer Iapyx, his faithful sidekick Achates, and Mimas as a guide.

In Book 5, Aeneas ' father Anchises dies and funeral games are celebrated for him.

On reaching Cumae, in Italy in Book 6, Aeneas consults the Cumaean Sibyl, who conducts him through the Underworld where Aeneas meets the dead Anchises who reveals his Rome's destiny to his son.

The bonds between Aeneas and Ascanius, Aeneas and Anchises, Evander and Pallas, Mezentius and Lausus are all worthy of note.

Virgil goes on to describe an encounter in Elysium between Aeneas and his father Anchises.

In Dante's epic The Divine Comedy, Elysium is mentioned as the abode of the blessed in the lower world ; mentioned in connexion with the meeting of Aeneas with the shade of Anchises in the Elysian Fields.

Later, Anius, an old friend of Anchises, gave aid to him, his son Aeneas, and his retinue when they were fleeing from Troy and en route to the future site of Rome.

As Troy is falling to the Greeks, Aeneas goes to his home to lead his father Anchises, Creusa, and their son Ascanius out of the city and into the countryside.

Anchises refuses to leave the house, prompting Aeneas to decide that he will leave to continue the fight against the Greeks so that he may die in battle.

Creusa grabs his feet and begs him to think of what would become of Iulus, Anchises and herself if Aeneas were to be killed.

After reaching Ceres ’ temple outside of the city, Aeneas leaves Anchises and Ascanius there to go back in search of Creusa.

Previous to the emigration of Aeneas, also a son of Anchises, Elymus and Acestes had fled from Troy to Sicily, and had settled on the banks of the river Crinisus, in the country of the Sicani.

He is a character of Roman mythology, and has a divine lineage, being the son of Aeneas, who is son of Venus and the hero Anchises, a relative of Priam ; thus Ascanius has divine ascendents by both parents, being descendant of Jupiter, Juno and Dardanus.

After the Trojan War, as the city burned, Aeneas escaped to Latium in Italy, taking his father Anchises and his child Ascanius with him, though Creusa died during the escape.

The Gens Julia, or the Julians, the clan to which Julius Caesar belonged, claimed to have been descended from Ascanius / Iulus, his father Aeneas, and, ultimately, the goddess Venus, the mother of Aeneas in myth, his father being the mortal Anchises.

* Alcathous, son of Aesyetes, husband of Hippodameia, the daughter of Anchises and sister of Aeneas, who was educated in the house of Alcathous.

Because of their traditional ties, Evander aids Aeneas in his war against Turnus and the Rutuli: the Arcadian had known the father of Aeneas, Anchises, before the Trojan War, and shares a common ancestry through Atlas with Aeneas's family.

In the Iliad, when Diomedes injured Aeneas, Apollo rescued him.

First, Aphrodite tried to rescue Aeneas but Diomedes injured her as well.

Aeneas was then enveloped in a cloud by Apollo, who took him to Pergamos, a sacred spot in Troy.

In Homer, Aphrodite, venturing into battle to protect her son, Aeneas, is wounded by Diomedes and returns to her mother, to sink down at her knee and be comforted.

In Book VI of Virgil's Aeneid, the hero, Aeneas, travels to the underworld to see his father.

While down there, along with the dead, he is shown the place where the wrongly convicted reside, the fields of sorrow where those who committed suicide and now regret it reside, including Aeneas ' former lover, the warriors and shades, Tartarus ( where the titans and powerful non-mortal enemies of the Olympians reside ) where he can hear the groans of the imprisoned, the palace of Pluto, and the fields of Elysium where the descendants of the divine and bravest heroes reside.

Lastly, his father shows him all of the future heroes of Rome who will live if Aeneas fulfills his destiny in founding the city.

The Vulcan Presenting Venus with Arms for Aeneas is a template for a tapestry made by this factory.

Aeneas flees burning Troy, Federico Barocci, 1598.

His father was the second cousin of King Priam of Troy, making Aeneas Priam's second cousin, once removed.

In the Iliad, Aeneas is a minor character, where he is twice saved from death by the gods as if for an as yet unknown destiny.

Aeneas ' mother Aphrodite frequently comes to his aid on the battlefield ; he is a favorite of Apollo.

Aphrodite and Apollo rescue Aeneas from combat with Diomedes of Argos, who nearly kills him, and carry him away to Pergamos for healing.

Even Poseidon, who normally favors the Greeks, comes to Aeneas ' rescue after he falls under the assault of Achilles, noting that Aeneas, though from a junior branch of the royal family, is destined to become king of the Trojan people.

The history of Aeneas is continued by Roman authors.

During Virgil's time Aeneas was well-known and various versions of his adventures were circulating in Rome, including Roman Antiquities by Greek historian Dionysius of Halicarnassus ( relying on Marcus Terentius Varro, Ab Urbe Condita by Livy ( probably dependent on Quintus Fabius Pictor, fl.

As seen in the first books of the Aeneid, Aeneas is one of the few Trojans who were not killed in battle or enslaved when Troy fell.

When Troy was sacked by the Greeks, Aeneas, after being commanded by the gods to flee, gathered a group, collectively known as the Aeneads, who then traveled to Italy and became progenitors of Romans.

Aeneas tells Dido about the fall of Troy, by Pierre-Narcisse Guérin.

After a brief but fierce storm sent up against the group at Juno's request, Aeneas and his fleet made landfall at Carthage after six years of wanderings.

Aeneas had a year-long affair with the Carthaginian queen Dido ( also known as Elissa ), who proposed that the Trojans settle in her land and that she and Aeneas reign jointly over their peoples.