Content deleted Content added
LukeWiller (talk | contribs) →Material culture: fix |
LukeWiller (talk | contribs) →Latins in the Roman origin myth: fix image |
||
Line 55:
== Latins in the Roman origin myth ==
[[File:Aeneas Latium BM GR1927.12-12.1.jpg|thumb|right|400px|The Trojan hero [[Aeneas]]' legendary landing on the shores of Latium (note prow of his beached ship, right). Aeneas is holding his son, Ascanius, by the hand. A sow (left) shows him where to found his city ([[Lavinium]]). Roman marble bas-relief, c. AD 140–50. [[British Museum]], London]]
[[File:Latium Volcano.jpg|thumb|right|600px|View of the [[Alban Hills]], a volcanic plateau 20km SE of Rome. The region saw early Latin settlement and was the site of the legendary city of Alba Longa, supposedly the capital of Latium for 400 years before the foundation of Rome]]▼
=== Aeneas ===
Line 61 ⟶ 60:
The figure of Aeneas as portrayed in the ''Iliad'' lent itself to his adoption as the Roman "Abraham": a mighty warrior of (minor) royal blood who personally slew 28 Achaeans in the war, he was twice saved from certain death by the gods, implying that he had a great destiny to fulfil. A passage in Homer's ''Iliad'' contains the prophecy that Aeneas and his descendants would one day rule the Trojans.<ref>Homer ''Iliad'' XX.307</ref> Since the Trojans had been expelled from their own city, it was speculated that Aeneas and other Trojan survivors must have migrated elsewhere.
▲[[File:Latium Volcano.jpg|thumb|right|600px|View of the [[Alban Hills]], a volcanic plateau 20km SE of Rome. The region saw early Latin settlement and was the site of the legendary city of Alba Longa, supposedly the capital of Latium for 400 years before the foundation of Rome]]
The legend is given its most vivid and detailed treatment in the Roman poet [[Virgil]]'s epic, the ''[[Aeneid]]'' (published around AD 20). According to this, the Latin tribe's first king was [[Latinus]], who gave his name to the tribe and founded the first capital of the Latins, [[Laurentum]], whose exact location is uncertain. The Trojan hero [[Aeneas]] and his men fled by sea after the capture and sack of their city, [[Troy]], by the Greeks in 1184 BC, according to one ancient calculation. After many adventures, Aeneas and his Trojan army landed on the coast of Latium near the mouth of the Tiber. Initially, King Latinus attempted to drive them out, but he was defeated in battle. Later, he accepted Aeneas as an ally and eventually allowed him to marry his daughter, Lavinia. Aeneas supposedly founded the city of [[Lavinium]] (Pratica di Mare, [[Pomezia]]), named after his wife, on the coast not far from Laurentum. It became the Latin capital after Latinus' death.<ref>Livy I.1</ref> Aeneas' son (by his previous Trojan wife, a daughter of king [[Priam of Troy]]), [[Ascanius]], founded a new city, [[Alba Longa]] in the Alban Hills, which replaced Lavinium as capital city. Alba Longa supposedly remained the Latin capital for some 400 years under Aeneas' successors, the [[Alban kings|Latin kings of Alba]], until his descendant (supposedly in direct line after 15 generations) [[Romulus]] founded Rome in 753 BC.<ref>Livy I.23</ref> Under a later king [[Tullus Hostilius]] (traditional reign-dates 673–642 BC), the Romans razed Alba Longa to the ground and resettled its inhabitants on the ''mons Caelius'' ([[Caelian Hill]]) in Rome.
| |||