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HISTORY OF ROME.

INTRODUCTION.

ANCIENT ITALY.

THE peninsula of Italy lies nearest to that of Greece, and is surrounded on all sides by the sea, except on the north; there, the loftiest of the European mountains, the Alps, form a natural barrier which shuts it off from the rest of the continent of Europe. The length of Italy from the Alps to the Straits of Messina is 700 miles, and its breadth varies from 350 miles in Northern Italy to 100, on an average, in the more southern portions of the peninsula.

The coast bordering on the Tuscan and Ionian Seas is indented with deep gulfs and natural harbours, adapted for commerce and navigation, whilst broad plains stretch behind as if inviting cultivation. The shores of the Adriatic, unlike the coast on the Ionian and Tuscan Seas, is without ports, and the navigator, in order to escape the Illyrian labyrinth of islands which fringe the coast of Illyria, found no other refuge on the inhospitable shores of the Adriatic, than amongst the lagunes of Venetia.

Italy was accessible from the north by a few difficult and narrow passes. The first crossed the Maritime Alps. Five passed by Monte Ginevra, Mont Cenis (Cenisius), the little St. Bernard (Alpis Graja), the great St. Bernard (Penninus Mons), and the St. Gothard (Adulus Mons); another led by the lake of Como and over the Valteline; the eighth traversed the Brenner; the ninth, the Col de Tarvis; and the tenth led across the Julian Alps into Illyria.

Towards the south-western extremity, the Alps sink gradually

at the Col di Tenda to rise again near Savona under a new name, that of the Apennines. This range of mountains traverse nearly the whole length of Italy, and after separating into two branches, take a south-west direction through Lucania and the Bruttii to the extreme point of the peninsula. The average height of the Apennines is over 3000 feet, and their eastern slopes, which border the Adriatic coast, are covered with pasture grounds or wooded heights, down which numerous torrents flow towards the sea. On their western slopes, between the foot of the mountains and the coast, stretch the rich plains of Etruria, Latium, and Campania, watered by the tranquil streams of the Tiber, Liris and Vulturnus, but subject to the scorching south wind from the African desert, and rendered unhealthy by pestilential marshes. Both Cæsar and Augustus attempted to drain the Pontine marshes, but the herculean task remains still to be done. These plains form an exception, the rest of the Italian peninsula being everywhere diversified by steep and lofty hills and sequestered valleys, so much so that in some parts, as the Abruzzi and Calabria in Southern Italy, the country is inaccessible to an invading army.

The northern portion of Italy consists of the great plain drained by the river Padus or Po, and its many tributaries. This plain is flanked by the Alps, which curve in a majestic semicircle round it on the north. Anciently, Northern Italy consisted of two principal divisions, Liguria and Cisalpine Gaul, whilst its eastern extremity formed the Roman province of Venetia.

Central Italy comprised Etruria, Latium, and Campania on the west, whilst on the coast were Umbria, Picenum, and Samnium.

Lower or Southern Italy was at one time called Magna. Græcia, on account of its Greek colonies. It was divided into the four countries of Lucania, the Bruttii, Apulia, and Messapia. The islands adjacent to the Italian coast, Sicily, Sardinia, and Corsica, were considered by the Romans as separate provinces, though geographically belonging to it. The surface of these three large islands equal almost a quarter of the whole of the Italian peninsula.

From the banks of the Padus to the extremity of Italy, is one long line of volcanic formation. But the activity of the subterranean fires appears to be concentrated at the southern extremity of the line at Vesuvius, and that volcanic plain which extends along the coast of Campania, from Cuma to Capua,

called the Phlegraei Campi, again at Etna, and the Lipari Islands. In the north, there are only extinct craters, some of them now forming lakes, the volcanic hills of Rome, the naphtha springs of Tuscany, and the volcanoes of air and mud called Salses, existing in the neighbourhood of Parma Reggio, Modena, and Bologna.

The river Padus is navigable from Turin, and falls into the Adriatic by several mouths, the position of which varies constantly. Many of the tributaries of the Padus begin as mountain torrents formed from the melted snows of the Alps; these bring down débris and soil from the uplands which are always adding to the bed of the river. Of these tributaries, the Tessin has formed Lake Maggiore; the Adda, the lake of Como; the Oglio, the lake of Iseo; and the Sarca, the Lake Garda, from which it issues as the Mincio.

Amongst the largest rivers after the Padus or Po, are the Adige, which rises in the Alps and flows into the Adriatic; the Arno, whose source is in the Apennines, and which empties itself into the Tuscan Sea and the Tiber.

Nearly all the rivers of peninsular Italy have the capricious character of mountain torrents, rapid and of considerable volume in spring when the snows begin to melt, whilst during the droughts of summer they dry up, and even the largest of them are at all times almost useless for navigation.

THE POPULATIONS OF ANCIENT ITALY.

All the neighbouring countries of Italy contributed to form her population. The Iberians, the Sicani, and the Ligurians came from Spain; the Umbrians from Gaul; the Etruscans from Rhætia; various tribes of the Pelasgi from Illyria; and lastly Greeks, who settled in Southern Italy, called after them Magna Græcia.

The central part of Italy was occupied by the two indigenous races, named the Oscans and the Sabelli, or the Sabines and the Samnites, distinctive appellations of the same or kindred tribes. As long as ancient Italy was peopled by these independent races, united by no tie, like Asia Minor, it had no collective name. When the Greeks began to visit the west, and to form settlements on the coast of Italy, they seem to have divided the country according to the nations whom they found ruling along the coasts. At that time Italy was a portion only of the peninsula, and its limits seem to have varied at different times. ancient and original Italy consisted of that peninsula which is

"The

bounded by the isthmus lying between the bays of Scylacium and Napeturum, where the land contracts itself to twenty miles, and which later on formed the southern part of Bruttium."

The name of Italy is probably of native origin, deduced by the Greeks from one of the native kings, Italus, king of the Siculi. In very early times the Latins called a part of Central Italy, including Latium, Saturnia. Italy was also sometimes named Hesperia, both by Greek and Roman poets and writers, but strictly speaking, "Hesperia Magna" comprised the whole of the west, including both Italy and Iberia.

The early inhabitants of Italy have been classed-into three great divisions: the Iapygians, the Etruscans, and the Italians. The latter people occupied the central portion of the peninsula, and were again subdivided into two branches, the UmbroSabellians and the Latins, including the Samnites, Sabines, and Umbrians. The dialects of all these tribes clearly prove a common origin and near connection with the Greeks.

The Etruscans were a people originally quite distinct, both from the Italians proper and the Greeks. Their origin is unknown, but it is supposed that they descended into Italy from beyond the Alps, and that they spoke the same language as the Rhætians. Before the Romans rose to pre-eminence, the Etruscans inhabited not only Etruria but also the vast plain of the Po, as far as the foot of the Alps. Their religion was of a savage and gloomy character, consisting of mysterious and wild rites.

The Iapygians were amongst the oldest inhabitants of Italy. They dwelt in Calabria, and had probably been gradually driven towards the south-eastern extremity of Italy by the Latins and Sabellians, just as the ancient Britons were obliged under similar circumstances to retire into the mountainous districts of Wales and Cornwall before the invading Saxon.

Two other races began to settle at a much later date in Italy, within what is called historic times. These were the Gauls and the Greeks. The Gauls gave their name to the whole basin of the Po, which was called Gallia Cisalpina after them. They are supposed to have migrated from Gaul about the time of the Tarquins.

Southern Italy received the name of "Magna Græcia " in like manner, from the number of colonies planted by the Greeks in that district. Some of their chief towns were Tarentum, Sybaris, Croton, Metapontum, whilst their most northerly town was that of Cumæ in Campania.

The legends of the foundation and early history of Rome resemble in their marvellous and poetical character the early history of Greece, and were received both by Romans and Greeks as the undoubted record of facts. If we are obliged to consider these early traditions as belonging rather to mythology than history, we nevertheless have no choice but to make use of them as the only records left to us of the early beginnings of a city whose wonderful rise and universal empire were in reality the most marvellous incidents recorded in its annals.

CHAPTER I.

TRADITIONAL HISTORY OF THE FOUNDATION OF ROME AND OF

HER KINGS.

WE learn from tradition that the Aborigines of Latium had a king named Janus, son of Apollo. He was not a native of the country, and probably owing to his relationship to the gods, received Saturn with hospitality when driven from Olympus by Jupiter, and he offered the ill-used Saturn the Capitolinus hill as a compensation. In recognition of this generous reception, Saturn taught the art of cultivating corn and the vine to the Latins.

The Aborigines are said to have worshipped Janus and Saturn as the founders of a better mode of life, who taught them agriculture and to live in settled habitations. Of these fabled kings, Janus or Dianus was the god of the Sun, and Saturn, with his wife Ops, were the god and goddess of the Earth.

Early traditions record only three kings from Saturn and Janus to the epoch of the Trojan settlement. These were Picus, Faunus, and Latinus or Evander, the Arcadian-for Evander seems to be only Latinus in another form; it was he who built a town upon the Palatine hill. Hercules also visited Latium, where he abolished human sacrifice, and killed the brigand Cacus upon Mount Aventine.

It was during the reign of Latinus or Evander that the emigration of the Trojans under Æneas to Hesperia took place. Having escaped from the ruins of Troy, the hero and his son, Ascanius, landed on the coast of Latium, bringing with them their household gods or penates, and the sacred Palladium of Troy,

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