BOOK I. Of the asylum of Therefore he built the town on the Palatine hill, and called it Rome after his own name, and drew a furrow round it with the sacred plough, and along by the furrow he built a wall and dug a trench. But when Remus saw the doings of his brother, he mocked him, and leaped over the wall and the trench to show him how easily the town might be taken. Then Romulus was wroth and slew his brother and said, 'Thus may it be with anyone who dares to cross these walls.' And this remained a warning word for all future times, that no enemy should venture to attack Rome unpunished. After this Romulus opened a place of refuge on the Romulus. Capitoline hill. And there came a great many robbers and fugitives of all kinds from all the surrounding nations, and Romulus received them all and protected them and made them citizens of his town. How Romulus obtained wives for his people. How he slew Acron, king of Cænina. But there was a lack of women in the new community. Therefore Romulus sent messengers to the towns round about asking the neighbours to give their daughters in marriage to the Romans. But the messengers were sent back contemptuously, and they were told that there could be no union and no friendship with a band of robbers and outcasts. When Romulus heard this answer he hid his anger, and invited the dwellers round about to come to Rome with their wives and children to see the games which the Romans wished to celebrate in honour of the god Consus; and a great number of Sabines and others came; and when all eyes were fixed on the games Romulus gave his people a sign which had been agreed upon. And suddenly there rushed out a number of armed men, who surrounded the place and carried away the young women of the Sabines. But the parents of the women hurried away from Rome with curses against the faithless town, and swore to take vengeance on Romulus and on his people. First the men of Cænina rose, and would not wait until the others were ready for war, but sent out an army to lay waste the Roman land. But Romulus went out against them and drove them back, and slew Acron their king with his own hand. Then he returned triumphantly to the city, bearing the armour of the slain king on a pole, and brought it as an offering to Jupiter. Thus Romulus celebrated his first triumph over his enemies in the first war which he waged as a sign that Rome would subdue all her foes. CHAP. II. The story of Titus Tatius and Now when the men of Crustumerium and Antemnæ also went forth to take their revenge on the Romans for the rape of the women, Romulus marched against them and Tarpeia. subdued them in easy combat. But the Sabines, who lived further up the mountains in the direction of Cures, did not go forth till they had gathered a powerful army. And their king, Titus Tatius, pressed forward and encamped on the Quirinal hill, which lies opposite the Capitol. Now, one day, when Tarpeia, the daughter of the Roman captain on the Capitol, had gone out to draw water, the Sabines begged of her to open a gate and to let them into the citadel. This Tarpeia promised, having made them swear that they should give her what they wore on their left arms, meaning thereby their gold armlets and rings. Whereupon, when the Sabines had penetrated into the citadel, they threw their heavy shields which they wore on their left arms on Tarpeia and killed her with their weight. So the traitress met with her reward. Curtius Now when the Sabines had won the Capitol, they fought Of Mettus with the Romans who lived on the Palatine, and the and Hostus fighting was up and down in the valley which separates Hostilius. the two mountains. The champion of the Sabines was Mettus Curtius, and that of the Romans Hostus Hostilius. When Hostus fell, the Romans were seized with a panic, and they fled back to the Palatine, carrying Romulus with them in their flight. But at the gate of the town Romulus stopped, raised his hands to heaven, and vowed that he would build a temple on this spot dedicated to Jupiter Stator, that is, the Stayer of Flight,' if he would be helpful 'This explanation of the word Stator, which is the origin of the legend in the text, is very doubtful. Cicero (1 Catil. 3) takes it to mean the Establisher BOOK I. How the fight was stayed by the Sabine Women. to the Romans. And behold, as if a voice from heaven had commanded them, the Romans stayed their flight, turned round against the advancing Sabines, and drove them back against the Capitoline hill. Then it came to pass, that Mettus Curtius sank with his horse into the marsh, which then covered the lower part of the valley, and he almost perished in the marsh. And the place where this happened was called for ever after the Lake of Curtius. When the battle had come to a standstill, and Romans and Sabines were facing each other and ready to begi the battle afresh, behold, the Sabine women rushed between the combatants, praying their fathers and brothers on the one side, and their husbands on the other, to end the bloody strife or to turn their arms against them, the cause of the slaughter. Then the men were all quiet, for they thought the advice of the women reasonable; and the chiefs on each side came forward and consulted together, and made peace; and to put an end to all disputes for ever, they decided to make one people of the Romans. and Sabines, and to live peaceably together as citizens of one town. Thus the Sabines remained in Rome, and the city was doubled in size and in the number of its inhabitants, and Titus Tatius, the Sabine king, reigned jointly with Romulus. But as Tatius and his people came from Cures, the city of the Sabines, high up among the mountains, the united people was called the Roman people of the Quirites, and the name remained in use for all times. After this Tatius had a quarrel with the men of Laurentum, and when he brought offerings to the sanctuary of the Penates at Lavinium, he was slain by the Laurenhis people. From that time Romulus governed alone over the two peoples, and he made laws to govern them in peace and war. First of all he divided them into nobles and commons; the nobles he called Patricians, and the commons Plebeians. Then he divided the Patricians into Of the laws which Romulus made for and Founder of the City. Tu Jupiter, qui iisdem, quibus hæc urbs, auspiciis a Romulo es constitutus, quem Statorem hujus urbis atque imperii vere nominamus,' &c. For another explanation see Cox, Mythology of the Aryan Nations, i. 341. three tribes, the Ramnians, the Titians, and the Lucerans, and in each of these tribes he made ten divisions, which he called Curies. And when the Patricians assembled together to administer justice and to make laws, they came each in his curia and gave their votes, and the votes of each curia were counted, and what the greater number had decided, that was taken to be the wish of each curia. All the Patricians were equal among themselves, and every father of a family governed those of his own house, his wife, his children, and his slaves; having power over life and death. And several families united together and formed Houses, and the houses had their own sanctuaries, customs, and laws. But the Plebeians Romulus portioned out as tenants and dependants among the Patricians, and called them Clients, and commanded them to serve their masters faithfully, and to help them in peace and in war; and the Patricians he recommended to protect their Clients against all injustice, and on that account he called them Patrons, that is, Protectors. And from among the Patricians he chose a hundred of the oldest and wisest men to be his Council of Senators, that is, Elders, and to advise him on all great matters of state, and to help him to govern the city in time of peace. But out of the young men he chose a legion or army of 3,000 foot soldiers and 300 horsemen, according to the number of the three tribes and the thirty curies, out of every curia 100 foot soldiers and ten horsemen, and for the captain of the horsemen he chose a Tribune of the Celeres, for Celeres was the name of the horsemen, CHAP. taking of After the city had been so ordered and made strong to Of the defend her freedom, Romulus governed wisely and justly Fidene. for many years, and was beloved by his people as a father. He conquered his enemies in many wars, and won Fidena, an Etruscan town on the left bank of the Tiber, not far from Rome. Now when all that Romulus had to carry out was fulfilled according to the will of the gods, it came to pass that he assembled the people to a festival of atonement at How Romulus was taken up into heaven. BOOK I. The story of Romulus not historical. Euêmeristic interpretation of the legend. the Goat-pool, on the field of Mars, which extends from the town towards the north, even to the Tiber. Then there arose suddenly a fearful storm, and the sun was darkened, and out of the clouds came lightning, and the earth quaked with the thunder. And the people were frightened, and waited anxiously till the storm should clear away. But when daylight returned Romulus had disappeared and was nowhere to be found. And his people mourned for him. Then Proculus Julius, an honourable man, came to them and said that Romulus had appeared to him as a god, bidding him tell his people not to mourn for him, but to worship him as Quirinus, to practise valour and all warlike virtues, that they might please him and might gain for themselves the power over all other nations. Then the Romans rejoiced, and erected on the Quirinal hill an altar to the god Quirinus, and worshipped him as their national hero and their protector for ever afterwards. Critical Examination of the Legend of Romulus. In the preceding pages we have given the legend of the foundation of the town in its principal features, as it was probably first related by the oldest Roman historians, Q. Fabius Pictor and L. Cincius Alimentus, in the time of the second Punic war. We shall now proceed to show that it can make no claims to historical authenticity. The Romans of the later republic already had given up as untenable all that was miraculous in the legend of Romulus, but they fancied that by a rationalistic interpretation of the supernatural they could gain a plausible account of at least possible or probable events. The God of War was explained away. It was not Mars who loved the Vestal virgin and became the father of the twinfounders of Rome, but some stranger disguised as Mars frightened and deceived Rhea Silvia. The miraculous nurse of the children was not a she-wolf but a woman ' Dionysius, i. 77. |