12-18-2003, 05:46 AM
The tradition that there were seven kings is not the only tradition. Basically, the date of 753 BC for Rome's foundation does not fit the archaeology (villages founded 1000 BC ish, expansion to other hills by 700, urbanism by 600), so you either need more kings or fewer kings depending when you think that Rome became Rome. Other kings are recorded (e.g. Titus Tatius, a Sabine, and Mastarna, an Etruscan); the Romans got round this awkwardness by claiming that Tatius was co-ruler with Romulus, and Mastarna was another name for Servius Tullius.<br>
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Recent-ish excavations (late 1990s) in the upper Forum Romanum have found a stretch of defensive wall near the foot of the Palatine which does seem to date from the mid C8th BC. Excavators have called it the Wall of Romulus.<br>
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There is a big problem with the study of early Rome and that's the sources. Livy, writing six hundred or more years later, was not writing history as we understand it, but trying to hold up 'exempla' of behaviour of old to justify the way the Romans should be in his day. Modern commentators are divided. There are some who say that the myths contain a solid factual folk memory whilst others say that this is all tosh.<br>
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The best short summary is in the Oxford Classical Dictionary article "Rome (history)" by Tim Cornell. Cornell's "The Beginnings of Rome" (1995, Routledge) is also well worth reading. Cornell is one of those who say that "it is... possible that some elements are based, however dimly, on genuine memory". But even he also says that:<br>
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"According to the sources the city was originally ruled by kings, which is likely enough, but no confidence can be placed in the complex dynastic history or the dating of the canonical seven."<br>
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Other historians are even more sceptical than he is about what is knowable about early Rome. It's quite fun to watch them all argue.<br>
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My tutor taught me Greek history backwards; 5th century BC, then 6th century, then 7th/8th. He said that the only way you could understand why the ancient sources said what they did about the past was to see what they needed to write for the purposes of their own time. It sounds daft, but it worked really well. I wish I'd been taught Roman history the same way, so I'd have a better understanding of how Roman authors constructed the past to justify/explain their present.<br>
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Shaun <p></p><i></i>
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Recent-ish excavations (late 1990s) in the upper Forum Romanum have found a stretch of defensive wall near the foot of the Palatine which does seem to date from the mid C8th BC. Excavators have called it the Wall of Romulus.<br>
<br>
There is a big problem with the study of early Rome and that's the sources. Livy, writing six hundred or more years later, was not writing history as we understand it, but trying to hold up 'exempla' of behaviour of old to justify the way the Romans should be in his day. Modern commentators are divided. There are some who say that the myths contain a solid factual folk memory whilst others say that this is all tosh.<br>
<br>
The best short summary is in the Oxford Classical Dictionary article "Rome (history)" by Tim Cornell. Cornell's "The Beginnings of Rome" (1995, Routledge) is also well worth reading. Cornell is one of those who say that "it is... possible that some elements are based, however dimly, on genuine memory". But even he also says that:<br>
<br>
"According to the sources the city was originally ruled by kings, which is likely enough, but no confidence can be placed in the complex dynastic history or the dating of the canonical seven."<br>
<br>
Other historians are even more sceptical than he is about what is knowable about early Rome. It's quite fun to watch them all argue.<br>
<br>
My tutor taught me Greek history backwards; 5th century BC, then 6th century, then 7th/8th. He said that the only way you could understand why the ancient sources said what they did about the past was to see what they needed to write for the purposes of their own time. It sounds daft, but it worked really well. I wish I'd been taught Roman history the same way, so I'd have a better understanding of how Roman authors constructed the past to justify/explain their present.<br>
<br>
Shaun <p></p><i></i>
