The Eclogues

Taking as his generic model the Greek Bucolica by Theocritus, Virgil created a Roman version partly by offering a dramatic and mythic interpretation of revolutionary change at Rome in the turbulent period between roughly 44 and 38 BC. Virgil introduced political clamor largely absent from Theocritus' poems, called idylls, even though erotic turbulence disturbs the "idyllic" landscapes of Theocritus.