SHORT HISTORY OF EARLY ROME
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| Medieval Depiction |
The early history of Rome is shrouded in mystery.The origins of the city are the subject of many myths, which have become inextricably interwoven with historical fact. Several of these stories promoted the idea that the Trojans were the ancestors of the Romans. These myths were gathered together and embellished by the Roman poet Virgil (70–19 BCE) in his epic poem the Aeneid. Other stories regarding the founding of Rome by the twins Romulus and Remus were relayed by the later writers Livy (59 BCE–17 CE) and Plutarch (c. 46–120 CE).
The origins of Rome
According to legend, the story of the founding of Rome begins with the fall of another great ancient city,Troy. After Troy’s destruction, the Trojan hero Aeneas escaped with a small group of followers, eventually managing to reach the coast of Italy, where he landed on the estuary of the Tiber River and made a new home. He married a local princess, and their son, Ascanius, founded the city of Alba Longa on a site just southeast of present-day Rome. Ascanius’s descendants reigned there for 14 generations, until the ruling king Numitor was dethroned by his brother Amulius.
Amulius arranged for Numitor’s daughter, Rea Silvia, to become one of the Vestal Virgins, the priestesses who tended the sacred hearth of the goddess Vesta.They were all forbidden to indulge in sexual intercourse. Nevertheless, Rea Silvia was seduced by Mars, the god of war, and gave birth to twin boys in the sanctuary of Vesta. When the children were discovered, Amulius threw Rea Silvia into a dungeon and had the infants put in a wicker basket and set adrift on the river. The basket became caught in the bulrushes, where the babies were suckled by a she-wolf until they were found by a shepherd. He took the twins home, adopted them, and named them Romulus and Remus.
When the twins reached adulthood, they met up with the deposed King Numitor and, through a series of coincidences, discovered their true origin. Romulus and Remus then initiated a revolution in Alba Longa, and Amulius was killed. Eager to found their own city, the brothers retreated with other pioneers into the Tiber hills, around 12 miles (19 km) to the northwest.
Before starting to build, Romulus and Remus decided to consult the augurs (priests who interpreted the wishes of the gods) to determine which brother would be king of the new city. However, when the augurs presented their conclusions, a fight broke out, and Romulus killed his brother.
So, according to tradition, Romulus became the first king of Rome, founding the city in 753 BCE. Legend also has it that he marked out the city’s boundaries by plowing a furrow around the site, using a bronze plow pulled by a white ox and a white cow. In this way, he demarcated the sacred precinct called the pomerium and the Palatine Hill.
The rape of the Sabine women
The city of Rome prospered, but its population consisted only of men. To overcome this problem, Romulus attempted to persuade the neighboring Sabines to allow some of their women to marry Roman men.The Sabines refused, however.Romulus was forced to devise a cunning strategy. He invited all the Sabines to attend a religious celebration. The Sabines eagerly accepted the invitation, bringing their families along to enjoy the festivities.At Romulus’s signal, every Roman seized and abducted a Sabine woman.
This act led to a savage war, in which the Sabines tried to win back their kidnapped women. Eventually, however, the Sabine women themselves pleaded for the two sides to be reconciled, to stop the bloodshed. The Romans and the Sabines agreed to form a single state, which was jointly ruled by Romulus and the Sabine leader, Titus Tatius. Romulus survived Tatius and ruled until 715 BCE, when, according to legend, he was taken up to heaven in a chariot driven by his father, Mars.
The early kings of Rome
The tale of Romulus and Remus is almost certainly purely mythical, but from this point of the story onward, some historical facts may start to be mixed in with the fiction. After the disappearance of Romulus, Numa Pompilius was elected king by the senate (a council of wise men). He was a priestly king who established many of the Roman religious institutions. Numa Pompilius was said to have been instructed by a wood nymph with whom he held regular conversations. His peaceful reign was in contrast to that of his successor, the belligerent Tullus Hostilius, who ruled from 673 to 642 BCE and is thought to have destroyed Alba Longa. Tullus also founded the Curia Hostilia, an early meeting place of the senate.
Hostilius was succeeded in 641 BCE by the fourth king of Rome, Ancus Marcius, who was a grandson of Numa Pompilius.Ancus Marcius ruled until 616 BCE and is famous for a bridge, the Pons Sublicius, that he had built across the Tiber River. A notable conqueror, he seized a number of Latin towns and moved their inhabitants to Rome.
The Etruscan kings
The first civilization on the Italian Peninsula had been established by the Etruscans and was centered on Etruria (roughly present-day Tuscany). According to tradition, the last three kings of Rome were Etruscans.The first of these Etruscan kings was Lucius Tarquinius Priscus. Legend has it that he was the son of a Corinthian nobleman, Demaratus, who had immigrated to the Etruscan city of Tarquinii. Tarquinius Priscus, however, decided to move to Rome with his wife Tanaquil. As they approached Rome, the story goes, a screaming eagle swooped down and seized the cap from Tanaquil’s head. Tarquinius Priscus interpreted this as a favorable omen. Once established in Rome, he quickly acquired a reputation as a notable citizen.
After the death of Ancus Marcius in 616 BCE, Tarquinius Priscus was crowned king. Rome prospered under his reign. During this time, he was responsible for the construction of a number of public buildings. Tarquinius Priscus is also said to have initiated the Roman Games and to have constructed a drainage system in the city. His conquests of neighboring peoples added considerably to the population.
Tarquinius Priscus died in 575 BCE during a palace revolt. He was replaced by a favorite of his wife Tanaquil—Servius Tullius. A man of obscure descent, Servius had previously been the head of Tanaquil’s household and proved to be an able king. He created new classes of citizens and built a new fortified wall to protect the city. Later generations of Romans were to honor him as their favorite king, and they believed they owed many of their political institutions to him.
Servius was murdered in 534 BCE by his son-in-law and successor, Tarquinius Superbus (commonly known as either Tarquin the Proud or Tarquin the Younger).Tarquin, who was either the son or grandson of Tarquinius Priscus, seized the throne, murdered many supporters of the previous king, and proceeded to rule as a tyrant. He surrounded himself with a personal guard, pronounced judgments at random, and ignored political institutions. Tarquin distracted the people with military adventures and monumental construction projects. He is famous for having built a temple to Jupiter on the Capitoline Hill and paving the major streets of the city with blocks of granite. He is also credited with building the city’s first public sewers, including the great Cloaca Maxima, which still function today.
However, in spite of these achievements, the people of Rome were not prepared to tolerate such an oppressive government. The crisis came in 510 BCE when Tarquin’s son Sextus raped Lucretia, the wife of his own kinsman; Lucretia later committed suicide. Tarquin’s crime provided a focus for dissent, which surfaced soon afterward when a number of leading aristocrats, led by Lucius Junius Brutus, another distant relative of the king, rose up in revolt against the tyrant. Tarquin and his family fled from the city, and although he later tried to reclaim the throne, all his efforts failed. The people of Rome subsequently turned their backs on monarchy as a system of government; from that moment on, the Romans would always abhor the basic idea of kingship — the words king and tyrant became virtually synonymous in Latin. Instead, the power was placed in the hands of the senate and a number of elected officials.
Latium
The semimythical account of the early years of Rome left by poets such as Livy and Plutarch is not the only source of information about Rome’s development. Archaeologists and linguists have been able to piece together a parallel history of Rome that is more firmly based on historical fact. They have established that the plain lying between the Tiber River and the Apennine Hills was once populated by people who called their land Latium, and themselves Latini, or Latins.
The Latins were probably descended from a people who invaded Italy during the course of the second millennium BCE. These people spoke an Indo-European language and held funeral ceremonies, in which they cremated the bodies of their dead.The oldest settlement associated with this culture that has been excavated dates from the 16th century BCE.
Shortly after 1000 BCE, other population groups appeared. In contrast to their predecessors, they buried their dead. It is possible that these groups were related to the Sabines of legend. They were also an Indo-European people who spoke a Latin dialect. It is evident that, between 900 and 600 BCE, many Latin settlements existed, each with its own funeral customs.
Until the end of the seventh century BCE, Latium remained an underdeveloped rural area.The Latins lived in small hilltop villages, which may have been surrounded by wooden palisades. Their primitive huts were made of twigs sealed with pitch and had only two openings, a door and a hole in the roof to let out smoke. Urns shaped like these huts have been found holding cremation ashes.
From the late seventh century BCE onward, the area started to develop. Latium was in contact with some highly sophisticated cultures — the Etruscans to the north, the Greek colonies to the south, and Carthage, whose sailors regularly visited the coast. From the politically dominant Etruscans, the Latins acquired technical skills, artistic styles, and political and religious practices. As the population of Latium grew, farmland became scarce. To increase the area of viable agricultural land, dams and waterworks were built, some of which still survive.The hill villages gradually evolved into oppida (small fortified city-states), and the oppida formed themselves into federations, which originally had only a religious purpose but in the end became political as well.
The birth of Rome
Around 625 BCE, political unity among the oppida-dwellers gave rise to a city the size of Romulus’s pomerium in the valley between the Palatine Hill and the Capitoline Hill.The city, called Roma (a name of Etruscan origin), was initially ruled by kings. The rex, or king, performed the function of supreme judge, high priest, and commander-in-chief of the army, and he led his army in person. The king was advised (on his request) by a council of elders known as the senate, which also chose his successor. The senate’s nomination was accepted or rejected by acclamation in a public meeting or an army assembly. The populus (people) were also consulted in matters of war and peace.
Before the Etruscan domination of Rome, the monarchy is thought to have been largely ceremonial. Under the Etruscans, it assumed greater importance, but by 509 BCE, the Romans had put an end to both Etruscan power and the monarchy itself.
Roman society
In early Rome, there were two social classes, excluding slaves. These classes were the patricii (patricians), who originally were the only ones with political rights, and the other free Romans, the plebes (the masses, or plebeians).The plebeians were generally peasants and had little political power.This class distinction probably originated during the time of the monarchy, but it gained far greater political significance after the last king was deposed.
In Rome at this time, the head of a family wielded particular power. He was called the pater (father), and his authority over his wife, children (whatever their age), and slaves was initially absolute. A Roman pater had the right to kill his wife or sell his child as a slave without breaking the law. Fathers who were related and bore the same family name formed a gens (clan). In the beginning, the king ruled the clans through the senate, which was composed of the fathers of prominent families. It is likely that the fathers who sat on the council began to distinguish themselves from the family heads who did not.
The patricians comprised the populus (people), from which the army was originally drawn.The king called out the populus as needed and then led the army himself, preceded by his guards (called lictors) bearing the fasces. The fasces symbolized the king’s regal and later magisterial authority and consisted of cylindrical bundles of wooden rods wrapped around an ax and tied tightly together. The fasces symbolized unity as well as power. Servius Tullius is usually credited with a major reform that permitted plebeians, who by that time could hold property and wealth, to serve in the army. They were assigned to a rank in accordance with their wealth.
Class struggle
The class struggle that characterized the patrician–plebeian relationship was central to Roman social history and the development of government organizations. Gradually, the social and political barriers against the plebeians were eroded, but for a long time, the plebeians continued to exist as a separate and subordinate class. Marriages between patricians and plebeians were not recognized by law, and the children of such marriages lost their patrician status.
The patricians formed only a small minority of the free population, however. The fact that they managed to keep power in their own hands for as long as they did was largely due to an important social institution called the clientela (client system). Under this system, it was customary for free but powerless citizens to bind themselves to a powerful man of the patrician class. These people were called clientes and may originally have been tenants of the patrician, but as time went on, this was not always the case.The patrones (patron) could demand obedience and service from the clientes, but the bond of the clientela had mutual benefits. It was the patron’s duty to help the clientes in time of need, if they were involved in a lawsuit, for example.
The early republic
Once the kings were driven out of Rome, the city became a republic, meaning a state governed by the people. In practice, however, the government largely lay in the hands of the patricians. A great deal of the power resided in the senate. Just as it had previously elected the king for life from the patrician class, the senate now chose two chief executives to serve on an annual basis. Originally called praetors (leaders) and selected exclusively from among the patricians, these executives were later given the title of consul.
To some extent, the praetors inherited the power and pomp of the kings. They wore the royal purple on their togas and were preceded on ceremonial occasions by the lictors and fasces.They led the army to war and wielded absolute power over the citizens.However, as each praetor had the power of veto over decisions made by the other, neither had the kind of autocratic authority once held by the king. Furthermore, their power was limited by the fact that their term of office ended after one year.
The senate and other assemblies Much of the real power in the republic resided in the senate. The members of this assembly were drawn from a few leading patrician families. These patres were lifetime members, and their senate seats passed to their heirs as an inherited right. Under the monarchy, the mass of the plebeians were unrepresented in the government, but in the days of the republic, a second group of senators, drawn from the plebeians, was appointed. These senators were called the conscripti (enrolled), and the senators as a whole were called the patres et conscripti. Although the conscripti also held the office for life, they could not pass it on to their descendants.
The early republic also inherited a popular assembly from the time of the monarchy. The comitia curiata was originally made up of curiae (clubs) of warriors. The number of curiae was fixed at 30. Under the monarchy, the chief function of the comitia curiata was to confirm the election of a king. Over time, the assembly’s meetings became purely ceremonial, and by the time of the republic, its function had dwindled, so that just 30 individuals, each representing a single curia,were required to invest the praetors after an election.
The comitia centuriata
During the sixth century BCE, Rome had adopted the Greek mode of warfare, using a phalanx of heavily armed foot soldiers who fought in close formation, protected by large shields and using thrusting spears. Armor was expensive, and service in the Roman army was reserved for those who could afford to pay for their own military equipment. For this reason, Servius Tullius had conducted a census to determine the property of every citizen. Wealth, measured almost exclusively in terms of land, became the sole criterion for enlistment. Every year a legio (military conscription or draft) was drawn from those deemed able to afford military service. Each group of 100 men was referred to as a centuria (century), and from these annual conscriptions, a new kind of popular assembly developed — the comitia centuriata. The comitia curiata gradually lost its position to this new assembly, which consisted of serving soldiers and veterans.
The comitia centuriata met on the Campus Martius (Field of Mars) outside the city’s pomerium. The assembly included 30 centuries of men called juniores (juniors), who were between the ages of 17 and 46. Another 30 centuries were composed of seniores (seniors) — citizens who were too old to fight but who retained the right to vote. These 60 centuries of foot soldiers, together with 18 centuries of cavalry (equites), formed a propertied class that excluded citizens who were too poor to afford army service and were thus unable to vote.
By the end of the fifth century BCE, the number of Roman citizens had increased to such an extent that 40, rather than 30, centuries of juniors were regularly recruited. The legion also expanded to take in less heavily armed soldiers, who did not need to have as much property to qualify for army service. The army was thus divided into two separate classes.
By the third century BCE, there were six separate property classes in the comitia centuriata. The first class consisted of 18 centuries of equites and 80 centuries of juniors and seniors. The second, third, and fourth classes contained 20 centuries each, while the fifth class consisted of 30 centuries.There were also five additional centuries that were reserved for noncombatants, such as trumpeters and armorers. In all, the army was composed of 193 centuries.
The comitia centuriata had the power to decide whether Rome should go to war or not. It also elected magistrates, acted as a high court, and had some powers to legislate. Despite the addition of representatives of the poorer sections of society, the assembly was still dominated by the wealthy. The method of voting was not “one man, one vote”; it was by centuries. The votes of the 18 cavalry units were taken first, followed by those of the 80 first-class centuries.Voting halted as soon as a majority had been reached. If the first-class centuries voted as a bloc, then the centuries from the lower classes would not even get a chance to vote.
The rise of the plebeians
The plebeians never formed a homogeneous group, either economically or culturally. There were poor plebeians, middle-class plebeians, and wealthy plebeians. The ambitions of the poorest were limited to owning a piece of land and to seeing the revocation of the strict debt law that could have a debtor sold into slavery. The richest plebeians, however, had political ambitions.They wanted a share of the power and the privileges of the patricians. Many of the most respectable plebeians came from regions that had been conquered by Rome; these men had held prominent positions at home and wanted comparable status in their new place of residence.
Things came to a head in 494 BCE, when there was a mass exodus of plebeians from Rome. According to legend, they withdrew to a nearby mountain, where they formed an assembly called the concilium plebis (council of plebeians) and threatened to found a separate city if the patricians refused to recognize their assembly and the officials it chose. These officials were called the tribuni plebis (tribunes of the plebeians). Eventually, the plebeians were persuaded to return to Rome, and two tribunes of the plebeians were recognized. These two tribunes became spokesmen for the plebeian cause and could intervene if a plebeian was in danger of being punished unjustly.The tribunes could also override the decisions of the magistrates by uttering the single word veto (I forbid).
The number of tribunes of the plebeians was gradually increased to 10.The plebeians declared their tribunes to be inviolable, which meant that anyone attempting to arrest or intimidate them could be killed. Soon after the tribunes of the plebeians were officially sanctioned, an assembly of plebeians, called the concilium plebis tributum, started to be held, and in 471 BCE, it also received official recognition.
Another important victory was won by the plebeians in 445 BCE.The introduction of the Canuleian Law repealed the prohibition on marriages between patricians and plebeians and declared intermarriage to be legal. This move meant that rich plebeian families could now enter into alliances with patricians, a change that was bound to have longterm political consequences.
The comitia tributa
By the middle of the fifth century BCE, a new popular assembly had been formed. This new body was the comitia tributa (assembly of the districts), which was set up on the model of the concilium plebis but was an assembly of all classes of citizens, plebeians and patricians alike. Votes were taken by tribes, or districts, just as they were taken by centuries in the comitia curiata. However, no distinctions were made among the districts, while within each district, the principle of “one man, one vote” was upheld.
Over the years, Rome had grown too big to be governed by just two chief officials. For some time, the consuls had been appointing assistants, called quaestors, to handle some criminal cases. The quaestors were junior magistrates, and after 447 BCE, two were appointed annually by the comitia tributa. Soon afterwards, two additional quaestors were put in charge of public finances. From 421 BCE, the office was open to plebeians as well as patricians.
Another position to be established in the fifth century BCE was that of the aedile (temple functionary).This position was another official magistracy to which plebeians could be elected. There were originally two aediles, who were connected with an important plebeian cult center — a temple on the Aventine Hill dedicated to Ceres, the goddess of agriculture, and Liber and Libera, a pair of fertility and cultivation deities.The aediles had considerable economic power. As state officials, they were in charge of a number of public works, the public food supply, and the markets.
The number of magistracies that could be held by plebeians increased steadily over the years. However, the most important post — that of consul — remained in the hands of the patricians.
Legal protection
An important milestone in the evolving constitution of ancient Rome was the setting up in 451 BCE of a special commission of 10 learned men known as the decemvirs (decemvirate or 10 men). This move followed prolonged agitation on the part of the plebeians for the laws of Rome to be defined and written down, mainly to avoid arbitrary punishments being meted out by patrician magistrates. The task of the decemvirate was to record all common law and to define the penalties for breaking it. The resulting compilation was known as the Laws of the Twelve Tables, because the laws were engraved on 12 bronze tablets that were placed in the forum.
From that point on, the patrician magistrates could no longer make legal decisions at their own whim; they had to make their judgments in accordance with this formal standard. In theory, the tables granted equal rights to all free citizens, but in practice, the weak and vulnerable still had to rely on powerful patrons for protection or legal redress.
The Licinian-Sextian Laws
A further development in the struggle of the plebeians for political power was the introduction of a new office, that of military tribune with consular power, in 445 BCE. While the senate refused to allow a plebeian to act as consul, a plebeian could be elected as a military tribune. From 445 BCE onward, either two consuls or two military tribunes were elected each year. This practice continued until 367 BCE, when two tribunes, Licinius and Sextius, presented a bill to the comitia tributa proposing that the annual consulship should be restored and that one of the two consuls should be plebeian. The following year, Sextius became the first plebeian consul.
The same year, another new official appeared: the praetor. The praetor was a consular deputy and was primarily concerned with the administration of justice, but he could also take command of an army. Like the consuls, the praetor was elected by the comitia centuriata, the old military assembly. For 20 years, the office remained in the hands of the patricians, but in 337 BCE, the first plebeian was elected praetor.
In 356 BCE, a plebeian, Marcius Rutilus, was appointed dictator.The role of dictator had been established at the beginning of the fifth century BCE, when military emergencies made it imperative for one man to have absolute control of the armed forces. It was a command that lasted for six months only, and during that time, everyone was subject to the authority of the dictator.
In 351 BCE, a plebeian was elected to the office of censor for the first time. This was a relatively new office, to which two men were elected every five years. The censors were responsible for conducting the census and registering new members of the senate. Censors could also expel unworthy senators, making the office one of great significance and prestige.
The empowerment of the plebeians brought about a rapid change in the composition of the senate, which by the end of the fourth century BCE had become predominantly plebeian. This development improved the senate’s relationship with the concilium plebis, which was still a purely plebeian assembly. This body elected the tribunes of the people and passed resolutions that officially related only to the plebeians, but in practice affected everyone.
End of the class struggle
In 287 BCE, a historic law was enacted. The lex Hortensia, named after the plebeian dictator Hortensius, stipulated that a decree of the plebeian assembly should have the same effect in law as a decree of either of the other two assemblies, the comitia centuriata and the comitia tributa. This law was a major step in the class struggle and greatly increased the power of the richer plebeians. The poorer plebeians also had cause for satisfaction, because over the course of the fourth century BCE, the cruel debt law had been modified.A debtor could no longer be sold as a slave, and land was now regularly distributed among the less well-todo Romans.
The beginning of the third century BCE saw a new elite emerging in Roman society — the nobiles (nobles). These people were a mixture of patricians and plebeians who had held the highest office (the consulate), or whose fathers or forefathers had done so. This new hereditary ruling class of nobilitas (nobility) controlled the senate and, thanks to their array of clients and their own prestige, the popular assemblies as well. Once accorded little administrative authority, the senators now dominated government in both domestic matters and foreign affairs.
Senatorial power had increased with the power of Rome, and the struggle between patricians and plebeians seemed to be over, but Rome was never to become a true democracy. While 287 BCE saw the beginning of a period of relatively harmonious cooperation among the highest circles of Roman society, the hardships of the poorest plebeians remained unaltered. Despite the comparative peace on the Italian Peninsula and unparalleled expansion abroad, the old class contest was to reemerge in the political arena as the aristocratic and populist parties fought for control.
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THE VESTAL VIRGINS
The Vestal Virgins were six priestesses whose main function was to keep alight the eternal flame that burned in the public shrine of the goddess Vesta.Vesta was the goddess who presided over hearth and home, and every Roman family made offerings to her at mealtimes. Every city also had a public hearth, kept in a temple dedicated to Vesta. The fire in this hearth was never allowed to go out; it was the symbol of the city’s spiritual heart.
The Vestal Virgins were taken from patrician families and had to be between the ages of six and ten when they were selected.They each served for a total of 30 years — as a novice for the first 10 years, as a Vestal Virgin proper for the next 10 years, and then as a tutor to the novices for the final 10 years.
The Vestal Virgins had to take a vow of chastity, and if this vow was broken, the punishment was severe; the offender was buried alive. However, if a Vestal Virgin survived her 30-year term of service, she was released from her duties and permitted to marry.
THE ETRUSCANS
The Etruscans were a people who occupied the area of central Italy that is now Tuscany from around 900 BCE. No one is quite sure where they came from. One theory — the autochthonous theory — suggests that they were the descendants of the earliest known population of north and central Italy — the Villanovans. Another theory suggests that the Etruscans were immigrants who came from western Anatolia. The fifth-century-BCE Greek historian Herodotus maintained that the Etruscans were descended from the Tyrrhenians, who had come from the east via Lydia, and this theory is borne out by the fact that many of the Etruscans’ characteristics, such as their religious customs, seem to have eastern origins.
Wherever they came from, the Etruscans established a distinct culture that flourished from the beginning of the seventh century BCE.They had their own unique language, but their culture showed much Greek influence.They adopted many Greek myths and legends, and because they imported many Greek vases, their potters soon began imitating Greek ceramics. In the seventh century BCE, the Etruscans adopted the Greek alphabet.
Etruscan cities were carefully laid out and enclosed by a pomerium (sacred boundary). Later cities were laid out on a grid system.The temple occupied a special area.The front of the temple had two rows of columns — a feature of the so-called Tuscan style of architecture. Houses were built of sun-dried mud bricks and were either simple rectangular two-story dwellings or based on a more sophisticated design that consisted of a set of rooms arranged around a central courtyard. Originally, each city was ruled by a king, but in the fifth century BCE, the kings were replaced almost everywhere by governments of aristocrats.
Not a great deal is known about the Etruscan religion. However, one aspect of it did involve a process of divination by studying the internal organs of sacrificial animals.While the functions of many of the Etruscan gods are not known, their deities often resembled the gods of Greece and Rome; for example, their goddess Menerva was closely related to the Greek goddess of wisdom,Athena, and her Roman counterpart, Minerva.
The Etruscans were traders and conducted much of their commerce by sea. They exported materials such as iron ore, which was mined on the island of Elba, and craft items made from bronze and gold. In return, they imported exotic goods from Africa and craft items from mainland Greece.
The height of Etruscan power came in the sixth and fifth centuries BCE.Thereafter, their influence declined, and they came under frequent attack from Greeks, Latins, Romans, and Gauls.After Etruria was seized by the Romans, the Etruscan language gradually disappeared. Eventually, by the first century BCE, the Etruscans had been totally absorbed into the Roman culture.
THE LARES
Among the most important gods worshipped by the Romans were the Lares, protective spirits who presided over a number of different areas. For example, the Lares viales looked after people traveling by road, while the Lares permarini watched over seafarers. For most Romans, however, the most important Lar was the Lar familiaris, the family Lar.
The Lar familiaris was unusual in that he was seen as an individual figure when most Lares were worshipped as pairs of twins. He was worshipped in the home, often at a shrine that took the form of a miniature temple.The Lar familiaris was believed to live in the house itself, watching over successive generations. Lares were often represented by figurines of dancing youths.
THE LAWS OF THE TWELVE TABLES
The Laws of the Twelve Tables were established in 451 BCE after plebeian agitation for a formal code of law. A decemvirate, or committee of 10, was given the task of setting down the common law of Rome in clear terms.The resulting legal code covered both public and private life and reflected the patriarchal nature of the society for which it was written.The code covered family law, property rights and inheritance, debt, funeral rites, legal processes, and offenses against the community.
As far as family law was concerned, the code confirmed the almost unlimited authority of the pater familias (father of the family). He had the power of life and death over his wife, children, slaves, and plebeian clients, although he was obliged to call a family council before making a life-and-death decision.The position of women in society was completely subordinate to that of men.A woman was subject to her father before marriage and to her husband after marriage. If a woman became a widow, she was put in the charge of a male relative.
Crimes against private property attracted severe punishments.A person whose property had been stolen had the right to put the thief to death. Reflecting the importance of the food supply, agriculture was given special protection. Anyone who maliciously set fire to another’s crops could be burned alive.A debtor who could not pay his debts was regarded as a criminal; his creditor could put him to death or sell him as a slave.
These laws reflected the society’s predominant interest in possessions. Other provisions were more enlightened. For example, one law stipulated that a marriage could be ended by mutual consent; if a wife absented herself from the marital bed for three nights and declared herself unwilling to return, the marriage could be dissolved. Also stipulated in family law was the obligation of a father to give his sons (but not his daughters) a good education.
The Twelve Tables contain little legislation with regard to politics. However, the code did allow citizens to appeal to the popular assembly about decisions made against them in the courts.These laws were never formally abolished, and because they were written in Latin, they provided a foretaste of the use of Latin as the language of the legal profession throughout Europe.
Extracted from "Ancient Rome - An Illustrated History", Marshall Cavendish Reference, USA, 2011, excerpts pp. 6-23. Adapted and illustrated to be posted by Leopoldo Costa.
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