Rome, History Of, I - Beginnings
ROME, HISTORY OF, I - BEGINNINGS The Beginnings of Rome and the Monarchy. Both the city and the state of Rome are represented in tradition as having been gradually formed by the fusion of separate communities. The original settlement of Romulus is said to have been limited to the Palatine Mount. With this were united before the end of his reign the Capitoline and the Quirinal; Tullus Hostilius added the Caelian, Ancus Martius the Aventine; and finally Servius Tullius included the Esquiline and Viminal, and enclosed the whole seven hills with a stone wall. The growth of the state closely followed that of the city. To the original Romans on the Palatine were added successively the Sabine followers of King Tatius, Albans transplanted by Tullus, Latins by Ancus, and lastly the Etruscan comrades of Caeles Vibenna. This tradition is supported by other and more positive evidence. The race of the Luperci on February 15 was in fact a purification of the boundaries of the " ancient Palatine town," 1 the " square Rome " of Ennius ; 2 and the course taken is that described by Tacitus as the " pomoerium " of the city founded by Romulus. 3 On the Esquiline, Varro mentions an " ancient city " and an " earthen rampart," 4 and the festival of the Septimontium is evidence of a union between this settlement and that on the Palatine. 5 The fusion of these " Mounts " with a settlement on the Quirinal " Hill " is also attested by trustworthy evidence; 6 and in particular the line taken by the procession of the Argei represents the enlarged boundaries of these united communities. 7 Lastly, the Servian agger still remains as a witness to the final enclosure of the various settlements within a single ring-wall. The united community thus formed was largely of Latin descent. Indications of this are not wanting even in the traditions themselves: King Faunus, who rules the Aborigines on the Palatine, is Latin; " Latini " is the name ascribed to the united Aborigines and Trojans; the immediate progenitors of Rome are the Latin Lavinium and the Latin Alba. Much evidence in the language, the religion, the institutions and the civilization of early Rome points to the same conclusion. The speech of the Romans is from the first Latin, 8 though showing many traces of contact 1 Varro, L.L. vi. 34. 2 Fest. 258; Varro ap. Solinus i. 17.
3 Tac. Ann. xii. 24. For a full discussion of the exact limits of the Palatine city see Smith, Diet. Geog., s.v. "Roma"; Jordan, Topog. d. Stadt Rom, i. cap. 2; Gilbert, Topog. u. Gesch. d. Stadt Rom, i. caps. 1,2; and " Topography " below.
4 L.L. v. 48; cf. ibid. 50.
* Festus 348; Jordan i. 199; Gilbert i. 161. The seven " monies " are the Palatine with the Velia and Germalus, the Subura, and the three points of the Esquiline (Fagutal, Oppius and Cispius).
* See Mommscn, R.G. (7th ed.), i. 51.
7 Varro, L.L. v. 45, vii. 44; Jordan ii. 237.
8 See LATIN LANGUAGE.
with the neighbouring dialects of the Sabines and Volscians and also of Etruscans; the oldest gods of Rome Saturn, Jupiter, Juno, Diana are all Latin; "rex," "praetor," "dictator," " curia," are Latin titles and institutions.' The primitive settlements, with their earthen ramparts and wooden palisades planted upon them out of reach both of human foes and of the malaria of the swampy low grounds, are only typical of the mode of settlement which the conditions of life dictated throughout the Latian plain. 10 But tradition insists on the admixture of at least two non-Latin elements, a Sabine and an Etruscan. The question as regards the latter will be more fully discussed hereafter; it is enough to say here that while the evidence of nomenclature (Schulze, Geschichte der Lai. Eigennamen, Leipzig, 1904, p. 579, with the modifications suggested in the Classical Review, December 1907) shows that many Etruscan gentes were settled within the bounds of the early city, there is rto satisfactory evidence that there was any large Etruscan strain in the Roman blood." With the Sabines it is otherwise. The That union of the Palatine and Quirinal settlements Sabiae* which constituted so decisive a stage in the growth '" Rome - of Rome is represented as having been in reality a union of the original Latins with a band of Sabine invaders who had seized" and held not only the Quirinal Hill, but the northern and nearest peak of the Capitoline Mount. The tradition was evidently deeply rooted. The name of the god Quirinus, from which that of the Quirinal Hill itself presumably sprang, was popularly connected with the Sabine town of Cures. 11 The ancient worships connected with it were said to be Sabine. 1 * One of the three old tribes, the Tities, was believed to represent the Sabine element; 14 the second and the fourth kings are both of Sabine descent. By the great majority of modern writers the substance of the tradition, the fusion of a body of Sabine invaders with the original Latins, is accepted as historical; and even Mommsen allowed its possibility, though he threw back the time of its occurrence to an earlier period than that of the union of the two settlements. 16 We cannot here enter into the question at length, but some fairly certain points may be mentioned. The probability of Sabine raids and a Sabine settlement, possibly on the Quirinal Hill, in very early times may be admitted. The incursions of the highland Apennine tribes into the lowlands fill a large place in early Italian history. The Latins were said to have originally descended from the mountain glens near Reate. 18 . The invasions of Campania and of Magna Graecia by Sabine (more correctly Safine) tribes are matter of history (see SAMNITES), and the Sabines themselves are represented as a restless highland people, ever seeking new homes in richer lands. 17 In very early days they appear on the borders of Latium, in close proximity to Rome, and Sabine forays are familiar and frequent occurrences in the old legends. But beyond these general considerations recent inquiry enables us to advance to some few definite conclusions, (i) It may now be regarded as established beyond question that the patrician class at Rome sprang from a race other than that of the plebeians.
9 The title " rex " occurs on inscriptions at Lanuvium, Tusculum, Bovillae; Henzen, Bullettino dell'Inst. (1868), p. 159; Orelli, 2279; Corp. I. Lat. vi. 2125. For " dictator " and praetor," see Livy i. 23, viii. 3; cf. Marquardt, Rom. Staatsverwaltung, i. 475: for " curia," Serv. on Aen. i. 17; Marquardt i. 467.
10 B. Modestov, Introduction d. I'histoire romaine (translated from the Russian by M. Delines), Paris, 1907, supersedes other authorities such as Helbig, Die Italiker in d. Poebene; Pohlmann, Anfdnge Roms, 40; Abeken, Miltel-Italien, 61 seq.
11 The existence of a Tuscan quarter (Tuscus yicus) in early Rome may point to nothing more than the presence in Rome of Etruscan artisans and craftsmen. But see ETRURIA, Language.
12 Varro, L.L. v. 51.
13 Ibid. v. 74; Schwegler i. 248 seq. 14 Ibid. v. 55; Livy i. 13.
15 Mommsen, R.G. i. 43. Schwegler (R.G. i. 478) accepted the tradition of a Sabine settlement on the Quirinal, and considered that in the united state the Sabine element predominated. _ Volquardsen (Rhein. Mus. xxxiii. 559) believed in a complete Sabine conquest; and so did Zoller (Latium u. Rom, Leipzig, 1878), who, however, placed it after the expulsion of the Tarquins.
16 Cato ap. Dionys. ii. 48, 49.
17 Ibid. ii. 48, 49. For the institution of the " ver sacrum " see Schwegler, Rom. Gesch. i. 240; Nissen, Templum iv.
This was long ago recognized by Schwegler (see his Romische Geschichte, passim) on the sufficient ground of the great religious cleavage between the two orders. Such jealousy of mutual contact in religious matters as is apparent all through the history of the city very rarely, if ever, springs from any other source than a real difference of race. This point was developed by Professor W. Ridgeway in his Who were the Romans? (London, 1908), where he points out (a) that the deities tended by the three greater or patrician flamens, namely, Dialis, Martialis, Quirinalis, were all closely connected with the Sabines; (b) further, that the patrician form of marriage, the highly religious ceremony called Confarreatio, differed entirely from the other forms, Usus and Coemptio, which there is reason to attribute to a plebeian origin; (c) that the arms, especially the round shfeld, carried by the first class in the originally military constitution of Servius Tullius (see below), are characteristic of the warriors of Central Europe in the Early Iron and Bronze Age, whereas those of the remaining classes can be shown to have been in general use during the immediately preceding period in the Mediterranean lands.
For other archaeological evidence separating the patricians from the plebeians, and connecting the patricians closely with the Sabines the reader must be referred to Ridgeway's essay. It is, however, well to make special mention here of the tradition, which is given by Livy (ii. 16. 4), and is undated but not the less probable for being a non-annalistic tradition, preserved in the gens itself, of the prompt welcome given to the Sabine Appius Claudius, the founder of the haughtiest of all the Roman noble families, by the patricians of Rome and his immediate admission to all their political privileges. Ridgeway points out that this implies, at that early time, a substantial identity of race.
On the linguistic side of the question it is well to mention for clearness" sake that this Safine or patrician class marked its ascendancy all over Central and Southern Italy, from the 6th century B.C. onwards, by its preference for forming ethnic names with the suffix -no- which it frequently imposed also upon the communities whom it brought under its influence. Sabini (earlier Safini), Romani, Latini, Sidicini, Aricini, Marrucini, and the like are all names formed in this way (see further SABINI).
2. It may also now be regarded as certain that what we may call the Lower or Earlier Stratum (or Strata) of population in Rome, themselves spoke a language which was as truly IndoEuropean as the language of their Safine conquerors. In the article VOLSCI will be found evidence for the conclusion that the language of what has been there entitled the Co-Folk was not less certainly Indo-European, and in some respects probably a less modified form of Indo-European, than that of the Safines. A number of the names formed with the -co- suffix and with the -ati- suffix (which is frequent in the same districts) contain unmistakably Indo-European words such as Graviscae, Marlca, dea Marica, Volsci, Casinates, Soracte, Interamnites, Auxumates. The fusion of this earlier population with the patricians is far easier to imagine when it is recognized that the two parties spoke kindred though by no means identical languages. It is the essentially Indo-European character of the early inhabitants of the Latin plain which has led many scholars to doubt that there was any racial distinction at all between patricians and plebeians, but the increase of knowledge of the dialects spoken in the different regions of Italy has now enabled us to judge this question with very much fuller evidence.
3. There arises, however, the important question or questions as to the origin, or at least the ethnic connexions of this earlier stratum. The task of the historic inquirer will not be completely performed until at least some further progress has been made in connecting this earlier population of the western coast of Italy, on the one hand, with one or more of the early races (see SICULI, VENETI, LIGURIA, PELASGIANS) whom tradition declares to have once inhabited the soil of Latium; and on the other, with the people or peoples whom archaeological research reveals to us as having left behind them different strata of remains, all earlier than the Iron or Roman Age, both in Latium and in other parts of Italy. Professor Ridgeway has taken a short way with these problems which may prove to be the true one; he classes together as Ligurian all pre-Safine inhabitants of Italy save such elements as, like the Etruscans, can be shown to have invaded it over sea (see ETRURIA, Language). This is one of the most promising fields of investigation now open to scholars, but in view of the confused and mutilated shape in which the traditions current in ancient times have come down to us, it demands an exceedingly careful scrutiny of the archaeological and the linguistic evidence, and exceedingly cautious judgment in combining them. The point of outstanding importance is to determine whether the earlier Indo-European population is to be regarded as having been in Italy from the beginning of human habitation. Archaeologists generally like W. Helbig (Die Italiker der Poebene) and more recently B. Modestov (Introduction d I'histoire romaine, Paris, 1907) have been inclined to regard the Ligurians as the most primitive population of Italy, but to distinguish them sharply from the people who built the Lake Settlement and Pile Dwellings, which appear (with important variations of type): (i) in the western half of the valley of the Po; (2) in the eastern half of the same; (3) in Picenum; (4) in Latium; and (5) as far south as Tarentum. One of the most important points in the identification is the question of the method of burial employed at different epochs by the different communities. (See the works already cited, with that of O. Montelius, La Civilisation primitive en Italie.)
The populus Romanus was, we are told, divided into three tribes, Ramnes, Titles and Luceres, 1 and into thirty curiae. The three names, as Schulze has shown (Lot. Eigennamen, p. 580), are neither more nor less people. than the names of three Etruscan gentes (whether or not derived from Safine or Latin originals), and the tradition is a striking result of the Etruscan domination in the 6th century B.C., 2 which we shall shortly consider.
Of far greater importance is the division into curiae. In Cicero's time there were still curies, curial festivals and curiate assemblies, and modern authors are unquestionably right in regarding the curia as the keystone of the primitive political system. It was a primitive association held together by participation in common sacra, and possessing common festivals, common priests and a common chapel, hall and hearth. As separate associations the curiae were probably older than the Roman state, but, 3 however this may be, it is certain that of this state when formed they constituted the only effective political subdivisions. The members of the thirty curiae form the populus Romanus, and the earliest known condition of Roman citizenship is the communio sacrorum, partnership in the curial sacra. Below the curia there was no further political division, for there is no reason to believe that the curia was ever formally subdivided into a fixed number of gentes and families. 4 At their head was the rex, the ruler of the united people. The Roman " king " is not simply either the hereditary and patriarchal chief of a clan, the priestly head of a The community bound together by common sacra, but the Uag.
elected magistrate of a state, but a mixture of all three. 5 In 'The tradition connecting the Ramnes with Romulus and the Titles with Tatius is as old as Ennius (Varro, L.L. v. 55). The best authorities on the question, earlier than Schulze's epoch-making treatise, are Schwegler i. 505, and Volquardsen, Rhein. Mus. xxxiii. 538.
2 They are traditionally connected only with the senate of 300 patres, with the primitive legion of 3000, with the vestal virgins, and with the augurs (Varro, L.L. v. 81, 89, 91; Livy x. 6; Festus 344; Mommsen i. 41, 74, 75; Genz, Patncisch. Rom, 90).
3 It is possible that, the curiae were originally connected with separate localities; cf. such names as Foriensis, Veliensis (Fest. 174; Gilbert i. 213).
4 Niebuhr's supposition of ten gentes in each curia has nothing in. its favour but the confused statement of Dionysius as to the purely military 5exa5 (Dionys. ii. 7; cf. Muller, Philologus, xxxiv. 96).
6 Rubino, Genz and Lange insisted on the hereditary patriarchal character of the kingship, Ihne on its priestly side, Schwegler on its elective. Mommsen came nearest to the view taken in the text, but later times, when no " patrician magistrates " were forthcoming to hold the elections for their successors, a procedure was adopted which was believed to represent the manner in which the early kings had been appointed. 1 In this procedure the ancient privileges of the old gentes and their elders, the importance of maintaining unbroken the continuity of the sacra, on the transmission and observance of which the welfare of the community depended, and thirdly the rights of the freemen, are all recognized. On the death of a king, the auspicia, and with them the supreme authority, revert to the council of elders, the patres, as representing the gentes. By the patres an interrex is appointed, who in turn nominates a second; by him, or even by a third or fourth interrex, a new king is selected in consultation with the patres. The king-designate is then proposed to the freemen assembled by their curiae for their acceptance, and finally their formal acceptance is ratified by the patres, as a security that the sacra of which they are the guardians have been respected. 2 Thus the king is in the first instance selected by the representatives of the old gentes, and they ratify his appointment. In form he is nominated directly by a predecessor from whose hands he receives the auspicia. But it is necessary also that the choice of the patres and the nomination of the interrex should be confirmed by a solemn vote of the community.
It is useless to attempt a precise definition of the prerogatives of the king when once installed in office. Tradition ascribes to him a position and powers closely resembling those of the heroic kings of Greece. He rules for life, and he is the sole ruler, unfettered by written statutes. He is the supreme judge, settling all disputes and punishing wrongdoers even with death. All other officials are appointed by him. He imposes taxes, distributes lands and erects buildings. Senate and assembly meet only when he convenes them, and meet for little else than to receive communications from him. In war he is absolute leader, 3 and finally he is also the religious head of the community. It is his business to consult the gods on its behalf, to offer the solemn sacrifices and to announce the days of the public festivals. Hard by his house was the common hearth of the state, where the vestal virgins cherished the sacred fire.
By the side of the king stood the senate, or council of elders. In the descriptions left us of the primitive senate, as in those of the rex, we can discover traces of a transition from senate an ear ^ er state of things when Rome was only an assemblage of clans or village communities, allied indeed, but each still ruled by its own chiefs and headmen, to one in which these groups have been fused into a single state under a common ruler. On the one hand the senate appears as a representative council of chiefs, with inalienable prerogatives of its own, and claiming to be the ultimate depositary of the supreme authority and of the sacra connected with it. The senators are the patres; they are taken from the leading gentes; they hold their seats for life; to them the auspicia revert on the death of a king; they appoint the interrex from their own body, are consulted in the choice of the new king, 4 and their sanction is necessary to ratify the vote of the assembled freemen. On the other hand, they are no longer supreme.
failed to bring out the nature of the compromise on which the kingship rests.
1 Cic. De Legg. iii. 3 ; Livy iv. 7.
2 " Patres auctores facti," Livy i. 22; "patres fuere auctores," ibid. i. 32. In 336 B.C. (Livy viii. 12) the Publilian law directed that this sanction should be given beforehand, " ante initum suffragium," and thus reduced it to a meaningless form (Livy i. n). It is wrongly identified by Schwegler with the " lex curiata de imperio," which in Cicero's day followed and did not precede election. According to Cicero (De Rep. ii. 13, 21), the proceedings included, in addition to the " creation " by the comitia curiata and the sanction of the patres, the introduction by the king himself of a lex curiata conferring the imperium and auspicia; but this theory, though generally accepted, is probably an inference from the practice of a later time, when the creatio had been transferred to the comitia centuriata.
3 For the references, see Schwegler i. 646 seq.
4 If the analogy of the rex sacrorum is to be trusted, the " king " could only be chosen from the ranks of the patricii. Cic. Pro Domo, 14; Gaius i. 122.
They cannot appoint a king but with the consent of the community, and their relation to the king when appointed is one of subordination. Vacancies in their ranks are filled up by him, and they can but give him advice and counsel when he chooses to consult them.
The popular assembly of united Rome in its earliest days was that in which the freemen met and voted by their curiae (comitia curiata 6 ). The place of assembly was in the Comitium at the north-east end of the Forum, 6 at the summons and under the presidency of the king or, failing him, of the interrex. By the rex or the interrex the question was put, and the voting took place curiatim, the curiae being called up in turn. The vote of each curia was decided by the majority of individual votes, and a majority of the votes of the curiae determined the final result. But the occasions on which the assembly could exercise its power must have been few. Their right to elect magistrates was apparently limited to the acceptance or rejection of the king proposed by the interrex. Of the passing of laws, in the later sense of the term, there is no trace in the kingly period. Dionysius's statement 7 that they voted on questions of war and peace is improbable in itself and unsupported by tradition. They are indeed represented, in one instance, as deciding a capital case, but it is by the express permission of the king and not of right. 8 Assemblies of the people were also, and probably more frequently, convened for other purposes. Not only did they meet to hear from the king the announcement of the high days and holidays for each month and to witness such solemn .religious rites as the inauguration of a priest, but their presence (and sometimes their vote) was further required to authorize and attest certain acts, which in a later age assumed a more private character. The disposal of property by will 9 and the solemn renunciation of family or gentile sacra 10 could only take place in the presence of the assembled freemen, while for adoption" (adrogatio) not only their presence but their formal consent was necessary.
A history of this early Roman state is out of the question. The names, dates and achievements of the first four kings are all too unsubstantial to form the basis of a sober Rome narrative; 12 a few points only can be considered as under the fairly well established. If we except the long event- ****** less reign ascribed to King Numa, tradition represents the first kings as incessantly at war with their immediate neighbours. The details of these wars are no doubt mythical; but the implied condition of continual struggle, and The narrow range within which the struggle is confined, may be accepted as true. The picture drawn is that of a small community, with a few square miles of territory, at deadly feud with its nearest neighbours, within a radius of some 12 m. round Rome. Nor, in spite of the repeated victories with which tradition credits Romulus, Ancus and Tullus, does there seem to have been any real extension of Roman territory except towards the sea. Fidenae remains Etruscan; the Sabines continue masters up to the Anio; Praeneste, Gabii and Tusculum are still untouched; and on this side it is doubtful if Roman territory, in spite of the possible destruction of Alba, extended to a greater distance than the sixth milestone from Rome. 13 But along the course 6 Cic. De Rep. ii. 13; Dionys. ii. 14, etc.
Varro, L.L. v. 155. For the position of the Comitium, see Smith, Diet. Geog., s.v. " Roma," and Jordan, Topog. d.Stadt Rom. (Petersen).
7 Dionys. l.c. ' Livy i. 26; Dionys. iii. 22. 9 Gaius ii. 101. 10 Gell. xv. 27.
11 Gell. v. 19, " Comitia praebentur, quae curiata appellantur." Cf. Cic. Pro Domo, 13, 14; and see ROMAN LAW.
n By far the most complete criticism of the traditional accounts of the first four kings will be found in Schwegler's Rom. Geschichte, vol. i.; compare also Ihne's Early Rome and Sir G. C. Lewis's Credibility of Early Roman History. More recently, E. Pais (Storia d" Italia) has subjected the early legends to learned and often suggestive criticism, but without attaining very solid results.
13 The fossa Cluilia, 5 m. from Rome (Livy ii. 39), is regarded by Schwegler (i. 585) and by Mommsen (i. 45) as marking the Roman frontier towards Latium. Cf. Ovid. Fast. ii. 681 ; Strabo 230, " lura^it yovv TOV irf/iirrou <coi rov IKTOV \t8ov . . . riiros 4>ijoTOt . . . opioc TTJS rbrt 'Puitalwv 7tjs."
of the Tiber below the city there was a decided advance. The fortification of the Janiculum, the building of the pans sublicius, the foundation of Ostia and the acquisition of the saltworks near the sea may all be safely ascribed to this early period. Closely connected, too, with the control of the Tiber from Rome to the sea was the subjugation of the petty Latin communities lying south of the river; and the tradition of the conquest and destruction of Politorium, Tellenae and Ficana is confirmed by the absence in historical times of any Latin communities in this district.
With the reign of the fifth king Tarquinius Priscus a marked change takes place. The traditional accounts of the last three kings not only wear a more historical air than those of ^e first four, but they describe something like a transformation of the Roman city and state. Under the rule of these latter kings the separate settlements are for the first time enclosed with a rampart of colossal size and extent. 1 The low grounds are drained, and a forum and circus elaborately laid out; on the Capitoline Mount a temple is erected, the massive foundations of which were an object of wonder even to Pliny. 2 To the same period are assigned the redi vision of the city area into four new districts and the introduction of a new military system. The kings increase in power and surround themselves with new splendour. Abroad, too, Rome suddenly appears as a powerful state ruling far and wide over southern Etruria and Latium. These startling changes are, moreover, ascribed to kings of alien descent, who one and all ascend the throne in the teeth of established constitutional forms. Finally, with the expulsion of the last of them the younger Tarquin comes a sudden shrinkage of power. At the commencement of the Republic Rome is rnce more a comparatively small state, with hostile and independent neighbours at her very doors. It is impossible to. doubt the conviction that the true explanation of this phenomenon is to be found in the supposition that Rome during this period passed under the rule of powerful Etruscan lords. 3 In the 7th and 6th centuries B.C., and probably earlier still, the Etruscans appear as ruling widely outside the limits of Etruria proper. They were supreme in the valley of the Po until their power there was broken by the irruption of Celtic tribes from beyond the Alps, and while still masters of the plains of Lombardy they established themselves in the rich lowlands of Campania, where they held their ground until the capture of Capua by the Samnite highlanders in 423 B.C. It is on the face of it improbable that* a power which had extended its sway from the Alps to the Tiber, and from the Liris to Surrentum, should have left untouched the intervening stretch of country between the Tiber and the Liris. And there is abundant evidence of Etruscan rule in Latium. 4 According to Dionysius there was a time when the Latins were known to the Greeks as Tyrrhenians, and Rome as a Tyrrhenian city. 6 When Aeneas landed in Italy the Latins were at feud with Turnus (Turrhenos? Dionys. {.64) of Ardea.whoseclose ally was the rutnlessMezentius, prince of Caere, to whom the Latins had been forced to pay a tribute of wine. 6 Cato declared the Volsci to have been once subject to Etruscan rule, 7 and Etruscan remains found at Velitrae, 8 as well as the second name of the Volscian Anxur, Tarracina (the city of Tarchon) , confirm his statement. Nearer still to Rome is Tusculum, with its significant name, at Praeneste we have a great number of Etruscan inscriptions and bronzes, and at Alba we hear of a prince Tapxenos,' lawless and cruel like Mezentius, who consults the " oracle of Tethys in Tyrrhenia." Thus we find the Etruscan power encircling Rome on all sides, and in Rome itself a tradition of the rule of princes of Etruscan 1 Livy i. 36. * Ibid. i. 38, 55 ; Plin. N.H. xxxvi. 15.
1 This was the view of O. Mtiller, and more recently of Deecke, Gardthausen and Zoller.
4 W. Schulze, Gesch. d. Lai. Eigennamen, passim (esp. pp. 579 ff.) ; Zoller, Latium u. Rom, 166, 189; Gardthausen, Ma.sta.rna (Leipzig, 1882).
f Dionys. i. 29. Livy i. 2; Dionys. i. 64, 65; Plut. Q.R. 18.
7 Cato ap. Serv. Aen. xi. 567. 8 Helbig, Ann. d. Inst. (1865).
* Plut. Rom. 2. vapavoti&TaTof KO.I fci/ujroToj \ cf. RutuHan Tarquitius, Virg. Aen. x. 550.
origin. The Tarquinii come from south Etruria; their name can hardly be anything else than the Latin equivalent of the Etruscan Tarchon, and is therefore possibly a title ( = " lord " or " prince ") rather than a proper name. 10 Even Servius Tullius was identified by Tuscan chroniclers with an Etruscan " Mastarna." 11 Again, what we are told of Etruscan conquests does not represent them as moving, like the Sabellian tribes, in large bodies and settling down en masse in the conquered districts. We hear rather of military raids led by ambitious chiefs who carve out principalities for themselves with their own good swords, and with their followers rule oppressively over alien and subject peoples. 12 And so at Rome the story of the Tarquins implies not a wave of Etruscan immigration so much as a rule of Etruscan princes over conquered Latins.
The achievements ascribed to the Tarquins are not less characteristic. Their despotic rule and splendour contrast with the primitive simplicity of the native kings. Only Etruscan builders, under the direction of wealthy and powerful Etruscan lords, could have built the great cloaca, the Servian wall, or the Capitoline temple, monuments which challenged comparison with those of the emperors themselves. Nor do the traces of Greek influence upon Rome during this period u conflict with the theory of an Etruscan supremacy; on the contrary, it is at least possible that it was thanks to the extended rule and wide connexions of her Etruscan rulers that Rome was first brought into direct contact with the Greeks, who had long traded with the Etruscan ports and influenced Etruscan culture. 14 The Etruscan princes are represented, not only as having raised Rome for the time to acommandingpositioninLatium and lavished upon the city itself the resources of Etruscan civilization, The but also as the authors of important internal changes. Servian Theyarerepresentedasfavouringnewmenattheexpense relorms - of the old patrician families, and as reorganizing the Roman army on a new footing, a policy natural enough in military princes of alien birth, and rendered possible by the additions which conquest had made to the original community. From among the leading families of the conquered Latin states a hundred new members were admitted to the senate, and these gentes thenceforth ranked as patrician, and became known as gentes minores. The changes in the army begun, it is said, by the elder Tarquin and completed by Servius Tullius were more important. The basis of the primitive military system had been three tribes, each of which furnished 1000 men to the legion and 100 to the cavalry. 16 Tarquinius Priscus, we are told, contemplated the creation of three fresh tribes and three additional centuries of horsemen with new names, 17 though in face of the opposition offered by the old families he contented himself with simply doubling the strength without altering the names of the old divisions. 18 But the change attributed to Servius Tullius went far beyond this. His famous distribution of all freeholders (assidui) into tribes, classes and centuries, 19 though subsequently adopted with modifications as the basis of the 10 Miiller- Deecke, i. 69, 70; Zoller, Latium u. Rom, 168; cf. Strabo, p. 219; Serv. on Aen. x. 179, 198. The existence of an independent " gens Tarquinia " of Roman extraction (Schwegkr, i. 678) is unproven and unlikely. See now Schulze, Lai. Eigennamen, pp. 95 and 402 n. 6.
11 See speech of Claudius, Tab. Lugd. App. to Nipperdey's edit ion of the Annals of Tacitus, " Tusce Mastarna ei nomen erat." For the painting in the Frangois tomb at Vulci, see Gardthausen, Mastarna, 29 seg.; Annali dell. Instil. (Rome, 1859).
12 Cf. the traditions of Mezentius, of Caeles Vibenna, Porsena, etc.
13 Schwegler, R.G. i. 679 seq.
14 Ibid. i. 791, 792. He accepts as genuine, and as representing the extent of Roman rule and connexions under the Tarquins, the first treaty between Rome and Carthage mentioned by Polybius (iii. 22); see, for a discussion of the question, Vollmer, Rhein. Mus. xxxii. 614 seq.; Mommsen, Rom. Chronologic, 20; Dyer, Journ. of Philol. ix. 238.
16 Livy i. 35 ; Dionys. iii. 67 ; Cic. De Rep. ii. 20.
16 Varro, L.L. v. 89. Livy i. 36 ; Dionys. iii. 71 .
18 The six centuries of horsemen were thenceforward known as " primi secundique Ramnes " (Fest. 344; cf. Schwegler, 1.685 seq.). It is possible that the reforms of Tarquinius Priscus were limited to the cavalry.
u Cic. De Rep. ii. 22 ; Livy i. 42 ; Dionys. iv. 16.
political system, was at first exclusively military in its nature and objects. 1 It amounted, in fact, to the formation of a new and enlarged army on a new footing. In this force, excepting in the case of the centuries of the horsemen, no regard was paid either to the old clan divisions or to the semi-religious, semipolitical curiae. In its ranks were included all freeholders within the Roman territory, whether members or not of any of the old divisions, and the organization of this new army of assidui was not less independent of the old system with its clannish and religious traditions and forms. The unit was the centuria or company of 100 men; the centuriae were grouped in " classes " and drawn up in the order of the phalanx. 2 The centuries in front were composed of the wealthier citizens, whose means enabled them to bear the cost of the complete equipments necessary for those who were to bear the brunt of the onset. These centuries formed the first class. Behind them stood the centuries of the second and third classes, less completely armed, but making up together with those of the first class the heavyarmed infantry. 3 In the rear were the centuries of the fourth and fifth classes, recruited from the poorer freeholders, and serving only as light-armed troops. The entire available body of freeholders was divided into two equal portions, a reserve corps of seniores and a corps of juniores for active service. Each of these corps consisted of 85 centuries or 8500 men, i.e. of two legions of about 4200 men each, the normal strength of a consular legion under the early Republic. 4 It is noticeable also that the heavy-armed centuries of the three first classes in each of these legions represented a total of 3000 men, a number which agrees exactly with the number of heavy-armed troops in the legion as described by Polybius. Attached to the legions, but not included in them, were the companies of sappers and trumpeters. Lastly, to the six centuries of horsemen, which still retained the old tribal names, twelve more were added as a distinct body, and recruited from the wealthiest class of citizens. 5 The four " tribes " also instituted by Servius were probably intended to serve as the bases for the levy of freeholders for the new army. 6 As their names show, they corresponded with the natural local divisions of the city territory. 7 The last of these Etruscan lords to rule in Rome was Tarquin the Proud. He is described as a splendid and despotic monarch. Fall of His sway extended over Latium as far south as Circeii. themon- Aristodemus, tyrant of Cumae, was his ally, and archy. kinsmen of his own were princes at Collatia, at Gabii, and at Tusculum. The Volscian highlanders were chastised, and Signia with its massive walls was built to hold them in check. In Rome itself the Capitoline temple and the great cloaca bore witness to his power. But his rule pressed heavily upon the Romans, and at the last, on the news of the foul wrong done by his son Sextus to a noble Roman matron, Lucretia, the indignant people rose in revolt. Tarquin, who was away besieging Ardea, was deposed; sentence of exile was passed upon him and upon all his race; and the 'This is recognized by Mommsen, Gen/, and Soltau, as against Niebuhr, Schwegler and Ihne. Even in the later comitia centuriata the traces of the originally military character of the organization are unmistakable.
1 The century ceased to represent companies of one hundred when the whole organization ceased to be military and became exclusively political.
1 The property qualification for service in the first class is given at 100,000 asses (Livy), for the second at 70,000, third 50,000, fourth 25,000, fifth 11,000. It was probably originally a certain number of cows, afterwards translated into terms of money; cf. W. Ridgeway, The Origin of Coinage and Metallic Currency (Cambridge, 1892), p. 391. The same scholar, in his Who were the Romans? p. 17, has pointed out the ethnical meaning of the varieties of armature in the early army.
4 Pplyb. vi. 20; Mommsen, Rom. Trib. 132 seq.
6 Livy i. 43. Dionys. (iv. 18) and Cic. (De Rep. ii. 22) ascribe the whole eighteen to Servius. But the six older centuries remained distinct, as the "sex suffragia " of the comitia centuriata; Cic. De Rep. ii. 22.
6 Dionys. iv. 14, ts ris (cara-ypa<<ls TUV arpaTiuTuv.
7 Livy i. 43. The four were Palatina, Suburana, Exquilina, Collina.
people swore that" never again should a king rule in Rome. Freed from the tyrant, they chose for themselves two yearly magistrates who should exercise the supreme authority, and thus the Republic of Rome was founded. Three times the banished Tarquin strove desperately to recover the throne he had lost. First of all the men of Veil and Tarquinii marched to his aid, but were defeated in a pitched battle on the Roman frontier. A year later Lars Porsena, prince of Clusium, at the head of all the powers of Etruria, appeared before the gates of Rome, and closely besieged the city, until, moved by the valour of his foe, he granted honourable terms of peace and withdrew.* Once again, by Lake Regillus, the Romans fought victoriously for their liberty against Tarquin's son-in-law Mamilius, prince of Tusculum, and chief of the Latin name. Mamilius was slain; Tarquin in despair found a refuge at Cumae, and there soon afterwards died.
So, in brief, ran the story of the flight of the kings, as it was told by the chroniclers whose story Livy reports, though with explicit and repeated notes of reserve. Its details are most of them fabulous; it is crowded with inconsistencies and improbabilities; there are no trustworthy dates; the names even of the chief actors are probably fictitious, and the hand of the improver, Greek or Roman, is traceable throughout. 9 But there is no room for doubting the main facts of the emancipation of Rome from the rule of alien princes and the final abolition of the kingly office. (H. F. P. ; R. S. C.)
Note - this article incorporates content from Encyclopaedia Britannica, Eleventh Edition, (1910-1911)
