3.1.1 Text资料文件与下载

3.1. Roman Kingdom 753-509 BC

Nice to meet you again. This is the Chapter Three Ancient Roman Civilization.

Look at this painting.

1. This is the Colosseum in Rome, built c.(about maybe) 70 to 80 AD, it is one of the greatest works of architecture of ancient Rome. The Colosseum could hold 80,000 spectators; it was used for gladiatorial contests, animal hunting execution, and dramas. A gladiator was a man who had to fight against other men or wild animals in order to entertain the audience.

2. American poet Edgar Allan Poe (1809 – 1849) wrote in his poem To Helen “To the glory that was Greece, and the grandeur that was Rome”. In the first two chapters we have already talked about the glory of the ancient Greece, this and the next chapter we will look back the grandeur of the ancient Roman Civilization. Grandeur is the quality of being magnificent or splendid or grand.

The center of the Ancient Roman civilization was Italy. The shape of Italy looks like a big boot and to the north it borders France, Switzerland, Australia, and Slovenia. And to the south, there was a Sicily and Sardinia, Corsica. This island belonged to France. The Apennine Mountains form the peninsula's backbone and the Alps forms most of its northern boundary. The longest river of Italy is the Po, flows from the Alps on the western border and crosses the Po Valley on its way to the Adriatic Sea. From east to south and west Italy is surrounded by Adriatic Sea, Ionian Sea, Mediterranean Sea, Tyrrhenian Sea, and Ligurian Sea. Italy has many famous cities: Milan in Lombardy, Milan and Turin, Genoa, Venice of course, very famous Florence, Rome, Naples, and Palermo in Sicily. Even today across Italy even today we can see many historical sites from the ancient Roman civilization.

3. Let’s look at the territories of the Roman civilization: 509 BC, Roman Republic, 27 BC, Roman Empire, Western Roman Empire finished in 476, Eastern Roman Empire finished in 1453. Rome wasn't built in a day. We can feel the grandeur of the ancient Roman civilization from its long history of almost 13,000 years, form the founding of the city of Rome in the 8th century BC to the collapse of the Western Roman Empire in 476 AD, including the Roman Kingdom, Roman Republic and Roman Empire until the fall of the western empire.

4. There were two myths about the Founding of Rome.

The first one is the twin brothers and she-wolf. Romulus and Remus were twin brothers, their mother was a princess, and their father was Mars, the god of war, or the demi-god hero Hercules. Their uncle the king thought the boys would be a possible threat to his rule, so the king ordered them to be abandoned on the bank of the Tiber River to die. The twins were nurtured by a she-wolf until a shepherd found and adopted them. When they grow up they killed the king and decided to establish a city in the area of the seven hills, they argued about on which hill the city should be built. Romulus preferred the Palatine Hill but his brother preferred another. Finally Romulus killed his brother and built the city of on the Palatine Hill. And he became the first king of the Roman Kingdom. Since ancient times the image of the she-wolf suckling the twins has been a symbol of Rome. I think this story also seems a prophecy about the city’s future of political strife and bloodshed.

5. The second story was from the Roman epic the Aeneid written by Virgil. Aeneas was a Trojan hero, the son of a prince and the goddess Aphrodite, Roman name Venus. After the fall of the city of Troy, he led some survivors underwent a series of adventures around the Mediterranean Sea, and finally arrived Italy. He was the first true hero of Rome, and an ancestor of Romulus and Remus. This painting is Aeneas flees burning Troy.

6. Roman Kingdom

Little is certain about the history of the Roman kingdom, because nearly no written records from that time survived. Rome was founded in a central western area of Italy called Latium, today’s Lazio. Latium was located on the bank of the River Tiber. People there were Latins, they spoke Latin. Through the power of the Roman Republic, it became the dominant language. We know Rome was founded by Romulus in 735BC, and he was the first king. According to the Roman historians Livy and Plutarch from 735BC to 509BC there were seven kings ruled Rome for nearly 150 years. This period of time is called Roman Kingdom. Before Rome was built, to the north of Latium there was an area Etruria, where the first Italian civilization Etruscan civilization emerged. Etruscans later invaded Rome. The Etruscan civilization finally merged into Roman civilization. Many scholars believed that Rome was founded by Latins who later merged with Etruscans.

King and the Senate

After Romulus, all other six kings were elected by the people of Rome to serve for life. Kings was elected by the Curiate Assembly, the principal assembly of the people of Rome. The People of Rome were organized into thirty units called “Curia”, plural "Curiae", actually they were the thirty Patrician families of the ruling class. The Curiate Assembly had legislative powers, the right of making and passing laws. And king has supreme military, executive, and judicial authority through the use of imperium, imperium in Latin means the supreme power to command. Imperium was granted to the king by the Curiate Assembly. When a king died, the Supreme power would go to the Senate, which was responsible for finding a new king. According to legend, Romulus established the Senate as an advisory council of the king. He selected the noblest men as Senators, altogether 300, each 100 representing one of the three ancient tribes of Rome: Latins, Sabines, and Etruscans.

7. This is the map of Etruria and Latium in 750BC

8. Rape of Lucretia is a historical event happened in 509BC in Rome. Lucretia was a noblewoman; she was raped by Tarquin, the son of the last king of Roman kingdom, Tarquin the Proud, an Etruscan. After raped by Tarquin Lucretia killed herself. This caused a revolution. This event marked the end of the Roman Kingdom and the start of the Roman Republic.

9. This is part of a painting The Tragedy of Lucretia by the Italian Renaissance master Sandro Botticelli. In the center of the painting we can see the dead body of Lucretia is on public display as a heroine. People were shocked, sad and angry. Her husband Lucius Junius Brutus standing beside is taking an oath to expel the king and his family from Rome. After the revolt the king was overthrow and exiled, his son fled but soon was killed. The Curiate Assembly elected two consuls to hold power together. Lucretia’s husband Lucius Junius Brutus became the one of the two first consuls. And this was the end of Roman Kingdom.

10. Look at the Key words: The Colosseum, twin brothers and the she-wolf, Aeneas, Roman Kingdom, Rape of Lucretia

This is the first part of Chapter Three.