The Comic History of Rome

PREFACE

Some explanation is perhaps due from a writer who adopts the title of Comic in relation to a subject which is ordinarily considered to be so essentially grave as that of History. Though the epithet may be thought by many inappropriate to the theme, this work has been prompted by a very serious desire to instruct those who, though willing to acquire information, seek in doing so as much amusement as possible.

It is true that professedly Comic literature has been the subject of a familiarity not unmixed with contempt on the part of a portion of the public, since that class of writing obtained the popularity which has especially attended it within the last few years; but as whatever disrepute it has fallen into is owing entirely to its abuse, there is no reason for abandoning an attempt to make a right use of it. The title of Comic has therefore been retained in reference to this work, though the author has felt that its purport is likely to be misconceived by many, and among them not a few whose judgment he would highly esteem, who would turn away from a Comic History solely on account of its name, and without giving themselves the trouble to look into it. Those persons are, however, grievously mistaken who have imagined that in this, and in similar books from the same pen, the object has been to treat History as a mere farce, or to laugh at Truth – the aim of the writer having invariably been to expose falsehood, and to bring into merited contempt all that has been injudiciously, ignorantly, or dishonestly held up to general admiration. His method of telling a story may be objected to; nevertheless, if he does his utmost to tell it truly, he ought not, perhaps, to be very severely criticised for adopting the style in which he feels himself most at home; and if his opinions are found to be, in the main, such as just and sensible persons can agree with, he only asks that his views and sentiments may be estimated by what they contain, and not by any peculiarity in his mode of expressing them.

The writer of this book is animated by an earnest wish to aid, as far as he is able, in the project of combining instruction with amusement; and he trusts he shall not be blamed for endeavouring to render such ability as he possesses available for as much as it is worth, in applying it to subjects of useful information.

Those who are not disposed to approve of his design, will perhaps give him credit for his motive; and he may with confidence assert, that, from the care and attention he has bestowed upon this work, it will be found to form (irrespective of its claims to amuse) by no means the least compendious and correct of the histories already in existence of Rome to the end of the Commonwealth. If he has failed in justifying the application of the title of Comic to his work, he has reason to believe it will be found accurate. Though the style professes to be light, he would submit that truth does not necessarily make more impression by being conveyed through a heavy medium; and although facts may be playfully told, it is hoped that narrative in sport may be found to constitute history in earnest.

CHAPTER THE FIRST.

FROM THE FOUNDATION OF ROME TO THE DEATH OF ROMULUS

The origin of the Romans has long been lost in that impenetrable fog, the mist of ages; which, it is to be feared, will never clear off, for it unfortunately seems to grow thicker the more boldly we try to grope about in it. In the midst of these fogs, some energetic individual will now and then appear with a pretty powerful link, but there are not enough of these links to form a connected chain of incidents.

One of the oldest and most popular traditions concerning the origin of the Romans, is that founded on the remarkable feat of filial pick-a-back alleged to have been performed by Æneas, who is frequently dragged in head and shoulders, with his venerable parent, to lead off the march of events, and, as it were, open the ball of history.

It is said that after1 the siege of Troy, Æneas snatched up his Lares and Penates in one hand, and his father, Anchises, in the other; when, flinging the former over the right shoulder, and the latter over the left, he ran down to the sea-shore, called "A boat a-hoy," and escaped from the jaws of destruction into the mouth of the Tiber. There are many reasons for disbelieving this story, and it is quite enough to deprive it of weight to consider what must have been the weight of Anchises himself, and the large bundle of household images that Æneas is alleged to have been burdened with. Putting probability in one scale, and an elderly gentleman, with a lot of Lares and a parcel of Penates in the other, there can be no doubt which will preponderate. It happens, also, that Troy is usually said to have been destroyed 430 years before Rome was founded,2 so that it would have been to this day as unfounded as the tale itself, if the city had had no other foundation than that which Æneas was supposed to have given it.

The Latin Bards have adorned this story in their own peculiar way, by adding that Æneas, on his arrival in the Tiber, resolved to sacrifice a milk white sow, in gratitude for his safety. The sow, who must have been an ancestor of the learned pig, got scent of her fate, and running two or three miles up the country, produced a sad litter of thirty little ones; when Æneas, fancying he heard a voice telling him to build a town on the spot, determined, "please the pigs," to found a city there. The classical story-teller goes on to say, that Latinus, king of the Latins, happened to be at war with Turnus – or as we might call him Turner – King of the Rutuli, when the Trojans arrived, and the former, thinking it better worth his while to make friends than foes of the immigrants, gave them a tract of land, which rendered them extremely tractable. On the principle that one good turn deserves another, they turned round upon Turnus, and completely routed the Rutuli. Latinus, to show his gratitude, gave Lavinia – not the "lovely young" one, who Thomson tells us, "once had friends;" but his own daughter of that name – in marriage to Æneas, who at the death of his father-in-law, ruled over the city, and called his colony Lavinium. Tradition tells us further that Æneas had a son, Ascanius, sometimes called Parvus Iulus, or little Juli, who subsequently left Lavinium, and built Alba Longa – a sort of classical long acre – in that desirable neighbourhood known as the Alban Mount, which, from its becoming subsequently the most fashionable part of the city, may deserve the name of the Roman Albany.

The descendants of Ascanius are said to have reigned 300 years, and an attempt has been made to fill up the gap of these three centuries with a quantity of dry rubbish of the antiquarian kind, which occupies space, without affording anything like a solid foundation for the structure to be built upon it. Of such a nature is the catalogue of matters alleged to have connected Æneas with the actual founders of Rome; but though names and dates are given, there is little doubt that the value of names is not even nominal, and that if we trust the dates, we shall rely on the falsest data.

The spirit of antiquarianism is as ancient as the subjects on which it employs its ingenuity, and the Romans began puzzling themselves at a very early period about their own origin. A long course of fabrication ended in rearing up a legendary fabric, which was acknowledged by all the Roman bards; and however much they may have doubted the truth of the tale, they deserve some credit for the consistency with which they have adhered to it.

The legend states that one Procas, belonging to the family of the Silvii, or Silvers, had two sons, – the elder, to whom the kingdom was left, being called Numitor, and the younger going by the name of Amulius. Though Numitor was the bigger brother, he does not seem to have been, pugilistically speaking, the better man, for he was deprived of the kingdom by Amulius, who, to prevent the chances of the law of primogeniture again taking effect, by placing any of Numitor's descendants on the throne, caused Rhea Silvia, the only daughter of that individual to become a virgin in the Temple of Vesta. The Vestals were, in fact, the old original nuns, withdrawing themselves from the world, and entering into a solemn vow against marriage during thirty years; after which period they were free to wed, though they were scarcely ever invited to avail themselves of their rather tardy privilege. The senior sister went by the highly respectable name of Virgo Maxima – or old maid in chief – and was doubtless something more than ordinary in her appearance, as well as in her position. The Vestals were required to be plain in their dress, and in order to extend this plainness as far as possible to their looks, their hair was cut very short, however much they may have been distressed at parting with their tresses. Their chief duty consisted in keeping up the fire on the altar of Vesta, and they were prohibited on pain of death from giving to any other flame the smallest encouragement. In the event of such an offence having been committed by an unfortunate Vestal, who found her position little better than being buried alive, she was made to undergo literally that awful penalty.

Though the duties of the Vestals were rigidly enforced, and the letting out of the sacred fire was, in some cases, punished by the extinction of the delinquent's vital spark, they enjoyed some peculiar advantages. Though their acts were under strict control, they were, in one sense, allowed a will of their own; for they were permitted, even when under age, to make their own testaments. They occupied reserved seats at public entertainments; and if they happened to meet a criminal in custody, they had the privilege of releasing him from the hands of the police of the period. Notwithstanding these inducements, the office of Vestal was not in much request; and, in the event of a vacancy, it was awarded by lot to some young lady, whose dissatisfaction with her lot was usually very visible. Such is a brief outline of the duties and liabilities of the order into which Amulius forced his niece, and it has been the subject of complaint in more recent times that Rome still occasionally does as Rome used to do. We will now return to Rhea Silvia, who appears to have entered the service of the goddess as a maid-of-all-work; for she was in the habit of going to draw water from a well; and it was on one of these aquatic excursions she met with a military man, passing himself off as Mars who paid his addresses to her, and proved irresistible.

Rhea Silvia gave birth to twins; upon which her cruel uncle ordered her to be put to death, and desired that her infant offspring should be treated as a couple of unwelcome puppies, and got rid of by drowning in the ordinary manner.

The children were placed in a cradle, or, as some say, a bowl, and turned adrift on the river; so that Amulius, if he had any misgiving as to the security of his crown, preferred to drown it in the bowl with his unhappy little relatives.

It happened that there had been such a run on the banks of the Tiber, that its coffers or coffer-dams had poured out their contents all over the adjacent plains, and caused a very extensive distribution of its currency. Among other valuable deposits, it chanced to lodge for security, in a branch connected with the bank, the children of Rhea Silvia, who, by the way, must have been very fortunate under the circumstances, in being able to keep a balance. The infants were not in a very enviable condition; for there was nobody to board and lodge them, though the Tiber was still at hand to wash and do for them. The high tide proved a tide of good fortune to the children, who were floated so far inland, that when the river receded, they were left high and dry at the foot of a fig3 tree, with no one, apparently, to care a fig what became of them. Under these circumstances a she-wolf, who had gone down to the Tiber to drink, heard the whimpering of the babies among the trees, and, her attention being drawn off from the water in the river to the whine in the wood, she came forward in the most handsome manner in the capacity of a wet-nurse to give them suck and succour. How this wolf became possessed of so much of the milk of human kindness, does not appear, and it is not perhaps worth while to inquire.

The children, it is said, were awakened by receiving a gentle licking from the tongue of the animal standing in loco parentis over them. Finding the situation damp, the wolf removed the infants to her den, where they were visited by a philanthropic woodpecker; who, when they were hungry, would bring them some tempting grub, or worm, by which the woodpecker soon wormed itself into the children's confidence. Other members of the feathered tribe made themselves useful in this novel nursery, by keeping off the insects; and many a gnat found itself – or rather lost itself – unexpectedly in the throat of some remorseless swallow. However well-meaning the animal may have been, the children could not have profited greatly, if there had been no one ready to take them from the month; and happily Faustulus, the king's shepherd, who had watched them as they were being carried to the wolf's cave or loup-hole, provided them with another loophole to get out of it. Taking advantage of the wolf's temporary absence from home, the "gentle shepherd," resolving to rescue the children, by hook or by crook, removed the babes to his own hut, and handed them over to his wife Laurentia, as a sort of supplement to their previously rather extensive family.

Some historians, refusing to believe the story of the Wolf and the Woodpecker, have endeavoured to reconcile probability with tradition, by suggesting that the wife of Faustulus had got the name of the Wolf from the contrast she presented to her lamb-like husband, and that the supposed woodpecker was simply a hen-pecker, in the person of Laurentia.

Romulus and Remus were the names of the two infants, who, as they grew up, began to take after their foster-mother the wolf, turning out exceedingly wild lads, with a lupine propensity for worrying the flocks, and going on altogether in a very brutal manner. Remus was taken up on a charge of sheep stealing, or something very like it, and brought before Numitor, his own grandfather, when a recognition took place in a manner not much in accordance with the ordinary rules of evidence. Romulus had also been apprised of his relationship by Faustulus, who must have made a pretty bold guess at a fact he could not have known; and the two lads, being adopted by Numitor, were sent for their education to Gabii, where everything was taught that men of rank in those days were expected to learn, and whence the word Gaby is clearly derivable. Anxious to do something for the old gentleman, their grandfather, Romulus and Remus got up a demonstration in his favour, and they succeeded in restoring him to the throne of Alba Longa, a long row of white houses, which was less of a territory than a Terrace, and it is a strange coincidence that Terracina, or little Terrace, formed one end of it. Amulius was killed, and leaving Numitor sole master of White's Row, Romulus and Remus resolved on a building speculation a great deal higher up – that is to say on the spot where they had passed the days of their infancy. Before the new city was commenced, a dispute arose, first, about what it should be called, and secondly, as to who should govern it. Romulus and Remus, being twins, could not bring the law of primogeniture to bear upon their little differences, and it was therefore agreed to refer the matter to augury, which should decide who was to be inaugurated as the ruler of the new colony. Romulus mounted the Palatine Mount, and Remus took his station on the Aventine, when both began to keep a very sharp look out for something ominous. Remus was the first to remark something odd in the shape of six vultures flying from north to south, but Romulus no sooner heard the news than he declared he had seen twelve, and the question arose whether, figuratively speaking, the one bird in hand seen by Remus should outweigh the two in the bush that subsequently appeared to Romulus. The augur, when appealed to, gave, as usual, a very ambiguous answer. It amounted, in effect, to the observation that there were six of one and a dozen of the other; so that the soothsayer, instead of having said anything to soothe, was far more likely to irritate. Both parties claimed the victory; Remus contending for the precedence usually granted to the early bird, and Romulus maintaining that he had been specially favoured, by having been permitted to see so many birds of a feather flock together. Romulus accordingly commenced drawing his plans in the Etruscan fashion, by causing a boundary line to be marked out with a plough, to which were yoked a heifer and a bull, a ceremony from which, perhaps, the English term bulwarks, and the French word boulevards or bulvards, may or may not be derivable. The line thus traced was called the Pomœrium, and where an entrance was to be made, it was customary to carry the plough across the space – a little engineering difficulty that gave the name of Porta to a gate, from the verb portare, to carry. Remus looked on at the proceedings in a half-quizzing, half-quarrelsome spirit, until the wall rose a little above the ground, when he amused himself by leaping derisively over it. "Thus," said he, "will the enemy leap over those barriers." "And thus," rejoined the superintendent or clerk of the works – one Celer, who acted in this instance with thoughtless celerity – "thus shall die whoever may leap over my barriers."4 With these words he gave Remus a mortal blow, and the legend goes on to state, that Romulus was immediately seized with remorse, and subsequent visits from his brother's ghost rendered Romulus himself little better than the ghost of what he used to be. Remus showed as much spirit after his decease as during his lifetime; and took the form of the deadly nightshade, springing up at the bed-side, to poison the existence of his brother.

Tradition tells us that Romulus came at length to terms with the ghost, who agreed to discontinue his visits, in consideration of the establishment of the festival of the Lemuria – called, originally, Remuria – in honour of his memory. The rites were celebrated bare-footed – an appropriate penalty for one who had stepped into a brother's shoes; the hands were thrice washed – a process much needed, as a sort of expiation for dirty work; – and black beans were thrown four times behind the back, with the superstitious belief that the growing up of the beans would prevent the stalking abroad of evil spirits. The unfortunate twin was buried on Mount Aventine, and Romulus ordered a double set of sceptres, crowns, and royal badges, in order that he might set up one set by the side of his own, in honour of his late relative. These duplicates of mere senseless symbols served only to commemorate the double part which Romulus had acted; for a vacant throne and a headless crown were but empty tributes to a murdered brother's memory.

The city having been built, was found considerably too large for the people there were to live in it; and as a place cannot, like a garment, be made to fit by taking it in, there was no alternative but to fill the city with any stuff that might serve for stuffing. Romulus, therefore, threw open his gates to any one who chose to walk in, which caused an influx of those who, from having no character at all, usually go under the denomination of all sorts of characters. Society became terribly mixed, and, in fact, the place was a kind of Van Demon's Land, crammed with criminals, replete with runaway slaves, and forming – in a word – a regular refuge for the morally destitute. It says something for the females of the period, that women were very scarce at Rome, and it is surprising that some learned philologist has never yet made the remark, that the fact of the word Ro-man being familiar to us all, while there is no such term as Ro-woman, may be taken as a collateral proof of the scarcity of the gentler sex in the city founded by Romulus.

The ladies of the neighbourhood were indisposed to listen to the addresses of the male population of Rome, which was quite bad enough to suggest the possibility of the Latin word male-factor having supplied the distinctive epithet "male" to the ruder sex in general. In vain were proposals of marriage made to the maidens of the adjoining states, who one and all declared they would not change their state by becoming the wives of Romans. Irritated by these refusals, Romulus determined to prove himself more than a match for these women, every one of whom thought herself too good a match for any of his people. He announced his intention to give a party or pic-nic for the celebration of the Consualia, which were games in honour of Consus, the god of Counsel, – a sort of lawyer's frolic, in which a mole was sacrificed, probably because working in the dark was always the characteristic of the legal fraternity. Invitations to these games were issued in due form to the Latins and Sabines, with their wives and daughters, many of whom flocked to the spot, under the influence of female curiosity.

The weather being propitious, all the Sabine beauty and fashion were attracted to the place, and the games, consisting of horse-racing, gave to the scene all the animation of a cup day at Ascot. Suddenly, at a preconcerted signal, there was a general elopement of the Roman youth with the Sabine ladies, who were, in the most ungallant manner, abandoned to their fate by the Sabine gentlemen. It is true that the latter were taken by surprise, but they certainly made the very best of their way home before they thought of avenging the wrong and insult that had been committed. Had they been all married ladies who were carried off, the cynic might have suggested that the Sabine husbands would not have objected to a cheap mode of divorce, but – to make use of an Irishism – there was only one single woman who happened to be a wife in the whole of the "goodly company." The small Latin states, Antennæ, Crustumerium, and Cœnina, were very angry at the supineness of the Sabines, whose King – one Tatius – seemed disposed to take the thing rather too tacitly. The three states above mentioned commenced an action on their own account, and Acron, the King of Cœnina, fell in battle by the hand of Romulus, who, stripping off the apparel of the foe, caused it to be carried to Rome and hung upon an oak, where the arms and armour of Acron, glittering among the acorns, were dedicated, as Spolia opima, to Jupiter Feretrius.5

Though Tatius had been the last, he was not destined to be the least of those taking part in the Sabine war; and he determined to rely less on strategy than stratagem. The water in those days was not so well laid on as in later times; when the lofty aqueducts, still running in ruins about the neighbourhood of Rome, were carried to an elevation fitted for the very highest service that could be desired. Rome, instead of being well supplied, was supplied by wells; and ladies of rank were accustomed to draw the water required for domestic purposes. It chanced, one afternoon, that Tarpeia, the daughter of Tarpeius, the commander of the Roman city, on the Capitoline Hill, was proceeding on an errand of the sort, when she met with Tatius, who, addressing her in the language of a friend, requested "a drink" of her pitcher. Tarpeia, dazzled by the splendour of his gold bracelets and glittering armour, could not resist the request of such a highly polished gentleman. Tatius had purposely electrotyped himself for the interview, and, seeing the effect he had produced, he intimated that he had several friends, who were covered with metal quite as attractive as that he wore, and that, if Tarpeia would only open the gate of the citadel to himself and party, she should have more gold than she could carry. The bargain was faithfully kept on both sides; for Tarpeia opened the gate to Tatius and the Sabines, who, on their part performed their contract to the letter, for, as they entered, they threw at her not only their bracelets but their breast-plates, completely crushing her with the weight of the gold she had coveted; and making her think, no doubt, that "never was poor woman so unmercifully put upon." So thorough an illustration of an embarras des richesses is not often met with in history.