BOOK I

1. Human memory can hardly recall another empire in the entire world smaller in its beginning or greater in its growth than the Roman Empire, which was begun by Romulus. Romulus was the son of Rhea Silvia, a Vestal Virgin, and, as it was believed, Mars. He was born a twin with his brother Remus. When he was eighteen years old and marauding with a group of shepherds, he established a small city on the Palatine hill, on April 21st, in the third year of the sixth Olympiad, in the three hundred and ninety-fourth year after the destruction of Troy.

2. After founding the city, which he named “Rome” after himself, he did as follows. He took in a large number of the neighboring people and selected one hundred of the older men, with whose counsel he would conduct all matters, and called them “senators” on account of their age. Then, since he and his people did not have wives, he invited all the neighboring tribes of the city of Rome to a show of games and seized their young girls. Wars broke out because of this, and he conquered the Caeninenses, Antemnates, Crustumini, Sabines, Fidenates, and Veians. All of their towns surrounded the city. When he failed to appear after a storm suddenly arose, he was believed to have crossed over to the gods and was deified, in the thirty-seventh year of his reign. Afterwards, in Rome, senators ruled for five days at a time, and a year passed in this way.

3. Afterwards, Numa Pompilius was chosen king. He indeed waged no wars, but benefited the state no less than Romulus, for he established both laws and customs for the Romans, who, for their habit of fighting, were already thought of as robbers and semibarbarians. He also defined the year, which had earlier been without order, into ten months and established countless sacred rites and temples in Rome. He died of illness in the forty-third year of his reign.

4. Tullus Hostilius succeeded him and renewed the wars. He defeated the Albans, who are at the twelfth milestone from the city of Rome. He also overcame in war the Fidenates and Veians, the former of whom are by the sixth milestone from the city, the latter by the eighteenth. He enlarged the city, having added the Caelian hill to it. When he had reigned for thirty-two years, he was struck by a lightning bolt and burned along with his house.

5. After him, Ancus Marcius, the grandson of Numa through his daughter, took control. He fought against the Latins. He added the Aventine hill and the Janiculum to the city. He founded a city by the sea at the mouth of the Tiber, near the sixteenth milestone from the city of Rome. He perished from illness in the twenty-fourth year of his reign.

6. Next, Tarquinius Priscus took over the kingdom. He doubled the number of senators and built the Circus in Rome. He instituted the Roman games which continue to our own time. He conquered the Sabines also, took a large amount of land from them, and joined it to the territory of the city of Rome. He was the first to enter the city in triumph. He built walls and sewers and began the Capitol. In the thirty-eighth year of his reign, he was slain by the sons of Ancus, the king whom he himself had succeeded.

7. Servius Tullius took over after him. He was born from a noblewoman, but one that was a captive and servant. He also subjugated the Sabines. He added three hills to the city: the Quirinal, Viminal, and Esquiline hills; and he dug a ditch around the walls. He was the first to arrange a census of everyone, which up until this time was unheard of throughout the world. Under him, with everyone reported in the census, Rome had eighty-three thousand citizens, including those in the country. He was murdered through the treachery of his son-in-law, Tarquinius Superbus (the son of the king whom he had succeeded), and his own daughter, whom Tarquinius had as a wife.

8. Lucius Tarquinius Superbus, seventh and last of the kings, conquered the Volsci, a tribe which is not far away from the city for those heading to Campania. He subjugated the cities of Gabii and Suessa Pometia, made peace with the Tuscans, and built a temple of Jupiter on the Capitoline hill. Afterwards, while attacking Ardea, a city located by the eighteenth milestone from the city of Rome, he lost his dominion; for his younger son, also named Tarquinius, had violated Lucretia, a most noble and chaste woman who was the wife of Collatinus. After she had complained of this injury to her husband, father, and friends, she killed herself in sight of everyone. Brutus himself, also a relative of Tarquinius, roused the people and removed him from power. Soon, the army, which was besieging the city of Ardea with the king himself, abandoned him as well. When he came to the city, he found the gates closed and himself shut out, and although he had reigned for twenty-four years, he fled with his wife and children. Thus, Rome was ruled by seven kings for two hundred and forty-three years, yet the land the Romans possessed, where it extended furthest, barely reached the fifteenth milestone.

9. Henceforth, they began to have consuls — two in the place of one king, chosen for the reason that if one of them were to be wicked, the other, having similar power, could restrain him. It was also decided that their power should not last longer than a year so that they would not become more insolent by a longer period of power. Those who knew they would be private citizens again after a year would be civil at all times. Therefore, in the first year after the kings were expelled, the consuls were Lucius Junius Brutus, who played the lead role in expelling Tarquinius, and Tarquinius Collatinus, the husband of Lucretia. But Tarquinius Collatinus’ position was immediately taken away, for it was resolved that nobody should remain in the city named Tarquinius. Therefore, after receiving his property, he moved away from the city, and in his place, Lucius Valerius Publicola was made consul. However, the expelled King Tarquinius incited a war against the city of Rome, and after collecting many tribes, he fought to be restored to his kingdom.

10. In the first battle, the consul Brutus and Arruns, son of Tarquinius, killed each other, but the Romans left victorious. The Roman matrons mourned a year for Brutus, the defender of their virtue, as if he was a common father to all. Valerius Publicola made Spurius Lucretius Tricipitinus, the father of Lucretia, his colleague, but he died shortly after from illness. He took another colleague for himself, Horatius Pulvillus. Thus, the first year had five consuls since Tarquinius Collatinus left the city because of his name, Brutus died in battle, and Spurius Lucretius died from illness.

11. Again the next year, Tarquinius waged war against the Romans in order to win back his kingdom. He was aided by Porsenna, the king of Tuscia, and almost took Rome but was defeated that time as well. In the third year after the kings were expelled, Tarquinius, since he could not recover his kingdom and Porsenna (who had made peace with the Romans) would not furnish him aid, went to Tusculum, a city not far from Rome, and stayed there for fourteen years as a private citizen, growing old with his wife. In the fourth year after the kings were expelled, the Sabines brought war to the Romans. They were conquered, and a triumph was celebrated. In the fifth year, Lucius Valerius, the colleague of Brutus and a four-time consul, died a natural death. He was so poor that the expense of his burial was paid by coins collected from the populace. The Roman matrons mourned him for a year, just as they had Brutus.

12. In the ninth year after the kings were driven out, when the son-in- law of Tarquinius had assembled a vast army to avenge the injury against his father-in-law, a new office was created in Rome, greater than a consulship, called a “dictatorship.” Also in the same year, a “master of horse” was made, who would take orders from the dictator. Nothing is closer to the power of government which your Serenity now holds than the ancient dictatorship, especially when Octavian Augustus, whom we will speak of later, and before him, Caius Caesar, ruled with the title and office of dictator. The first dictator of Rome was Titus Larcius; the first master of horse, Spurius Cassius.

13. In the sixteenth year after the kings were expelled, the people of Rome rose up on the grounds that they were being hard-pressed by the Senate and consuls. They then chose for themselves tribunes of the people, who would act as their own judges and defenders, and by whose protection they would be safe from the Senate and consuls.

14. In the following year, the Volsci renewed the war against the Romans and were defeated in battle. They also lost Corioli, the best city they had.

15. In the eighteenth year after the kings were ejected, Quintus Marcius, the Roman general who had taken Corioli, the city of the Volsci, was expelled from Rome. Angry over this, he hurried to the Volsci themselves and received assistance against the Romans. He defeated the Romans often and advanced all the way to the fifth milestone from the city. He was even about to attack his native city, having already scorned the deputies who had come seeking peace, when his mother Veturia and wife Volumnia came to him from the city. Overcome by their weeping and pleading, he withdrew his army. He was the second leader, after Tarquinius, who had opposed his country.

16. In the consulship of Caius Fabius and Lucius Virginius, three hundred noblemen from the Fabia family undertook a war alone against the Veians, promising the Senate and people that they themselves would finish the whole contest. All of the noblemen, each of whom ought to have been the leader of a great army, set out and fell in battle. Only one male, who could not be brought to the battle on account of his youth, survived from so great a family. After this, a census was held in the city, and it was found that there were one hundred and seventeen thousand, three hundred and nineteen citizens.

17. In the following year, when the Roman army was besieged on Mt. Algidus near the twelfth milestone from the city, Lucius Quintius Cincinnatus was made dictator. He possessed a field of four acres which he cultivated with his own hands. When he was found, busy working and plowing, he wiped off his sweat and put on the toga praetexta [a toga worn by higher magistrates and free-born boys with a purple stripe on its border]. Then, after slaughtering the enemy, he freed the army.

18. In the three hundred and second year after the founding of the city, the consular government ceased, and in the place of two consuls, ten were chosen, called “decemvirs,” who would hold the highest power. But although they conducted themselves well in the first year, in the second, one of them, Appius Claudius, attempted to seduce the young daughter of a certain Virginius who was serving honorably at that time on Mt. Algidus against the Latins. She was killed by her father in order to spare her from having to endure the debauchery of the decemvir. After returning to the soldiers, he incited an uprising. The decemvirs were stripped of their power and condemned.

19. In the three hundred and fifteenth year after the founding of the city, the Fidenates rebelled against the Romans. The Veians and their king, Tolumnius, supplied them aid. Both of these cities were quite close to Rome; Fidenae was by the sixth milestone from the city and Veii was by the eighteenth. The Volsci also joined up with them but were conquered by the dictator, Mamercus Aemilius, and the master of horse, Lucius Quintius Cincinnatus. They lost their king as well. Fidenae was taken and destroyed.

20. Twenty years later, the Veians rebelled. Furius Camillius was sent against them as dictator. He first conquered them in battle, then also took their city, the most ancient and richest in Italy, after besieging it for some time. After he took this city, he also took Falisci, a city that was no less noble. But he became unpopular because it was thought that he had divided the plunder unfairly, and for this, he was found guilty and expelled from the state. The Gallic Senones came to the city at once, pursuing the Romans after beating them at the river Allia by the eleventh milestone, and occupied it. Nothing could be defended against them except the Capitol. When the Capitol had been besieged for a long time, and the Romans were suffering from hunger, the Gauls departed, having received gold to desist from the siege. Camillus, who was spending his exile in a nearby city, came upon the Gauls unexpectedly and thoroughly defeated them. Afterwards, Camillus pursued them and defeated them in such a way that he recovered the gold which they had been given and all the military standards which they had captured. Thus, he entered the city for the third time in triumph and was called the second Romulus, as if he too had been a founder of the city.

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