last-of-the-romans: The Founding of Rome The most cherished legend concerned the founding of Rome.

last-of-the-romans:

The Founding of Rome

The most cherished legend concerned the founding of Rome. In its retelling Roman historians stress the grandeur of Romes’s origins, and paid little heed to accuracy.

Rome, the legend states, was planned by the gods who, after the Fall of Troy, ordered the defeated prince Aeneas, a son of Venus, to lead his fellow refugees to a promised land in the West, Surviving many trials and temptations on their roundabout voyage, the Trojans reached Italy. Eventually the joined forces with the Latins and with Aeneas as their king, founded Lavinium, a city near the coast and about 16 miles southeast of the site of Rome. Later, under Aeneas’ son Ascanius, they moved a few miles inland to begin a new city, Alba Longa.

In the 8th century BC, the legend continues, the Latin princess Rhea Silvia, sworn to chastity as a Vestal Virgin, gave birth to twin sons fathered by the god Mars. As punishment for the violation of her oath, her uncle, King Amulius, imprisoned her and ordered that infants, Romulus and Remus, be abandoned to die on the bank of the flooding Tiber. The boys were found by a she-wolf who nursed them until a shepherd discovered them and took them into his home. When they reached manhood, they resolved to build a new city on the Tiber, and Romulus traced to boundaries of Rome with his plow. And Remus meet his demise.