HISTORY OF ROME. 



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to 'fix' or 'drive in;' hence 'to build'): these, 

 either by ties of blood, or by nearness of locality, 

 were aggregated into clans, and their dwellings 

 formed clan-villages (thus pagus, which probably 

 meant at first only a single ' household,' came, by 

 a natural transition, to denote a collection of 

 households a hamlet, or a village). Such clan- 

 villages were, however, not regarded as inde- 

 pendent societies, but as parts of a political 

 canton or community the civitas or populus. 

 Each canton or civitas possessed a local centre or 

 lace of assembly, where justice was administered 

 t regular intervals, where markets and sports 

 ere held, and religious rites celebrated, and 

 hich was besides fortified, to serve as an asylum 

 or place of refuge for the inhabitants of the open 

 hamlets and their cattle in time of war. Such a 

 centre was termed the capitolium, i.e. ' the 

 height,' from being originally fixed on a height or 

 hill-top, and corresponded to the akra of the 

 reeks. Round this stronghold of the canton, 

 hich formed the nucleus or beginning of the 

 earliest Latin towns, houses gradually sprung up, 

 which in their turn were surrounded by the 

 oppidum (' work,' from opus), or the urbs (' ring- 

 wall,' connected with urvus, curvus, orbis) ; 

 ence, in later times, oppidum and urbs became, 

 aturally enough, the recognised designations of 

 town and city. 



The sites of the oldest of these cantonal-centres 

 or primitive towns in Latium are to be sought for 

 on the slopes of the Alban Hills, where the 

 springs are freshest, the air most wholesome, and 

 e position most secure. Tradition (which makes 

 'ba Longa the oldest seat of a Latin community) 

 here in accordance with natural probability, 

 n the same slopes lay Lanuvium, Aricia, and 

 Tusculum, to the great antiquity of which ancient 

 tradition bears testimony in many ways ; on the 

 iffshoots of the Sabine range, in the east of 

 tium, stood Tibur and Praeneste ; in the plain 

 tween the Sabine and Alban ranges, Gabii, 

 abici, and Momentum; on or near the coast, 

 urentum and Lavinium; and on the isolated 

 ills overlooking the Tiber (the boundary between 

 atium and Etruria), the frontier town of Rome, 

 "ow many cantons were originally in Latium, it 

 ; neither possible nor important to know. Tra- 

 : tion mentions thirty sovereign or politically inde- 

 ndent communities (with Alba Longa at their 

 ad), which formed the famous Latin league, 

 he historical order of their constitution is a point 

 :garding which we are equally ignorant, but 

 iere is reason to believe that the Roman canton, 

 at least its capital, the town of Rome, was 

 ong the latest political organisations of the 

 .tins. The history and fortunes of this canton 

 e now proceed briefly to trace. 



HISTORY OF ROME DURING THE EARLIEST OR 

 REGAL PERIOD. 



According to the myth of Romulus, Rome 

 was an offshoot from Alba Longa ; but the most 

 rational view of the city's origin is that which 

 is suggested by a consideration of its site. It 

 probably sprang into existence as a frontier-defence 

 against the Etruscans, and as an emporium for 

 the river-traffic of the country ; but whether it was 

 founded by a common resolve of the Latin con- 

 federacy, or by the enterprise of an individual 



chief, is beyond the reach even of conjecture. 

 The date fixed upon in the Romuleian myth for 

 the commencement of the city, by the formation 

 of the PomcErium (viz. 2ist April 753 B.C.), is, of 

 course, perfectly valueless in its precision. We 

 know and can know nothing whatever on the 

 point. The three ' tribes/ Ramnians, Tities, and 

 Luceres, who appear in the same myth as the 

 constituent parts of the primitive commonwealth, 

 suggest the idea that Rome (like Athens) arose 

 out of a synoikismos or amalgamation of three 

 separate cantons ; but Mommsen rejects as ' irra- 

 tional' the common opinion that these cantons 

 represent different races, and that the Romans 

 were a ' mongrel people,' made up of Latins, 

 Sabines, and Etruscans, with perhaps a dash of 

 Hellenic and imaginary ' Pelasgic ' blood in their 

 veins ! The existence of a Sabine element, repre- 

 sented by the Tities, is indeed admitted ; but its 

 introduction is thrown back to a period long 

 anterior to the foundation of the city, when the 

 Roman clans were still living in their open villages, 

 and nothing of Rome existed but its ' stronghold ' 

 on the Palatine. 



The motives which probably led to the building 

 of Rome, also led to its rapid development, so that 

 the great peculiarity of the Roman, as compared 

 with the other Latin cantons, is the prominence 

 which its urban life assumed in the earliest period. 

 No doubt the Roman continued to manage his 

 farm in the cantonal territory, but the insalubrity 

 of the Campagna, as well as the advantages of 

 river-traffic, and the necessity for watchfulness 

 imposed upon all frontier towns in rude ages, 

 must ever have acted as an inducement to him to 

 take up his residence as much as possible in the 

 city. So markedly is this the case, that the 

 beginnings of Roman history if the ancient 

 legend may be so designated are mainly records 

 of its urban expansion and political growth. 

 That the Palatine Hill was the oldest portion of 

 the city, is attested by a variety of circum- 

 stances. Not only does it hold that rank in the 

 Romuleian myth, but on it were situated the 

 oldest civil and religious institutions. The story 

 of the establishment of an asylum on the 

 Capitoline for homicides and runaway slaves, 

 with all its famous consequences the Rape of 

 the Sabine Women, the wars with the Latins 

 of Caenina, Antemnae, and Crustumerium, but 

 especially with the Sabines of Cures under their 

 king Titus Tatius, the tragic fate of Tarpeia, 

 and the fine feminine valour of the ravished 

 maidens, who had learned to love their captors 

 is historically worthless ; except, perhaps, so far 

 as it shews us how from the beginning the 

 Roman burghers were engaged in constant feuds 

 with their neighbours for the aggrandisement of 

 their power. The entire history of the ' regal 

 period,' in fact, has come down to us in so 

 mythical and legendary a form, that we cannot 

 feel absolutely certain of the reality of a single 

 incident. That such personages as Numa Pom- 

 pilius, Tullus Hostilius, Ancus Martius, Lucius 

 Tarquinius Priscus, Servius Tullius, and Lucius 

 Tarquinius Superbus, ever existed, or, if they did, 

 that the circumstances of their lives, their institu- 

 tions, their conquests, their reforms, were as the 

 ancient narrative describes them, are things which 

 no critical scholar can believe. The destruction of 

 the city records by the Gauls, when they captured 



