Virgil's earliest critics concentrated on discussing the style in which he wrote and the sources from which he drew his material. The Aeneid was written for a cultured and educated, extremely well-read audience, and almost immediately became a school text. Many Roman critics wrote treatises explaining the book's historical, religious, philosophical, and literary allusions to make it easier for teachers and students alike to understand. Others wrote explanations of difficult words or unusual grammar. In the fourth century, a teacher named Donatus published excerpts from many of these works to produce a kind of general reader's guide. A generation later, another teacher, Servius, relying in part on Donatus, produced a similar commentary for schools.

Macrobius's Saturnalia written in the first half of the fifth century, treated Virgil as a Roman bible. Macrobius depicted actual historical figures, including Servius, discussing the Aeneid. These figures were members of...