THE SHE-WOLF AND THE MEANING OF HISTORY IN WORDSWORTH AND MACAULAY

Literally speaking, there is no history of the she-wolf. Ancient writers, historians included, did not usually pretend to believe in a flesh-and-blood beast stumbling across a set of whimpering baby boys and offering them suckle. Almost from the beginning, figurative interpretations were devised to account for the story of Romulus's serendipitous rescue from certain death by the intervention of a wild animal. “I have no intention either to affirm or refute,” wrote Livy; “Some say,” echoes Plutarch. Although the she-wolf has no history that today we would promptly recognize as such, this same animal has repeatedly compelled writers to examine the meanings of the discourse we call history. Livy, Dionysius, and Plutarch prefaced the she-wolf's tale with reminders of the unreliability of their sources. Propertius hoped to tell of Rome's origins by imitating the she-wolf's task. Through the memory of the she-wolf, Petrarch could nostalgically relate to the grandeur of Roman antiquity. For du Bellay, the she-wolf's death allegorized the historic fall of Rome itself, the fate of an entire nation epitomized by that of a single beast. The rhetorical figure of allegory, as well as the language of misogyny, entertains a close relationship with the discourse of history. This relationship may be adversarial, with history proving allegory obsolete, or it may be complementary: Allegorical figures, in this sense, continue to help us interpret the meaning of history.