The king, Amulius, saw the twins as a threat to his rule and ordered them executed by drowning in the River Tiber, but they survived and were raised in the wilderness by a she-wolf. As the story goes, Romulus and his twin brother, Remus, were born to the daughter of a king who was impregnated by the god of war, Mars, in the real historical city of Alba Longa. When it comes to the founding of the city of Rome, it becomes impossible to differentiate the facts from the myths. For these reasons, discerning precise facts about the history of the Roman Kingdom is a difficult endeavor. These more recent Roman sources are recording remembered oral traditions that were often sensationalized and steeped in mythology. Most of what historians know about this era when Rome was ruled by kings comes from written sources that were recorded much later. When looking back that far into ancient history, there is very little in terms of direct sources that can be utilized, since very few written records from that time have survived. The Roman Kingdom existed from the traditional date of Rome's founding, 753 BC, until a public uprising overthrew the monarchy and established the Roman Republic in or around 509 BC. An era of Roman history that is much less discussed is the time immediately following the founding of the city, when it was ruled by a monarch as the Roman Kingdom. The growth of the city and development of its culture during this period, however, is widely accepted.Īnybody who has studied ancient Roman history knows that most of the time study is split into two very distinct periods: the Roman Republic, where the elected Senate controlled the government, and Imperial Rome, which was ruled by a series of autocratic emperors. There is evidence which supports the period of Kings, but exact rulers, dates, events and accomplishments will likely forever be unknown. Stories past down generation to generation would eventually find their way into the Historical records of such writers as Livy and Plutarch. The Kingdom period of Roman history is as much a part of myth and legend as the founding of the city.
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