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40-522: The name of the place is likely connected with the Curtia gens , a very old Roman Family with Sabine origins. The exact history of the feature was not well known even to the Romans themselves, and at least three different explanations were given for its name. Two were given by Livy , and another by Varro . By order of when they are said to have taken place: According to the oldest story (8th century BCE),

80-424: A curule chair which served as a throne, a purple toga picta , red shoes, and a white diadem worn on the head. Only the king could wear a purple toga. The supreme power of the state was vested in the king, whose position gave the following powers: Beyond his religious authority, the king was invested with the supreme military, executive, and judicial authority through the use of imperium . The imperium of

120-544: A chosen member of the Senate called an interrex . Candidates for the throne could be chosen from any source. For example, one such candidate, Lucius Tarquinius Priscus , was originally a citizen and migrant from a neighboring Etruscan city-state . The people of Rome, sitting as the Curiate Assembly, could then either accept or reject the nominated candidate-king. The king had twelve lictors wielding fasces ,

160-626: A great chasm opened on the Forum. An oracle directed the people to throw into the chasm “that what constituted the greatest strength of the Roman people,” and doing so would make the Roman nation last forever. After dropping various things into the ravine without result, a young horseman named Marcus Curtius (again, of the Curtia gens) saved the city by realizing that it was virtus that the Romans held most dear. In full armour on his horse, he jumped into

200-407: A two-man criminal court ( Duumviri Perduellionis ) which oversaw for cases of treason . Under the kings, the Senate and Curiate Assembly had very little power and authority; they were not independent bodies in that they possessed the right to meet together and discuss questions of state. They could only be called together by the king and could only discuss the matters the king laid before them. While

240-411: A very ancient sacrificial drowning ritual done when the feature was still large enough to form a pool. Alternatively, they could have been related to “profaners” mentioned in the inscription on the nearby Lapis Niger , making it a special location of punishment. The theme is related to high-mediaeval Celtic stories about lake-bursts . Marcus Curtius' self-sacrifice has been a popular theme since

280-523: Is made to the hereditary principle until after the fifth king Tarquinius Priscus . Consequently, some have assumed that the Tarquins' attempt to institute a hereditary monarchy over this conjectured earlier elective monarchy resulted in the formation of the Republic . Early Rome was ruled by the king ( rex ). The king possessed absolute power over the people; no one could rule over him. The Senate

320-636: The Lacus Curtius was drained and became part of the Roman Forum. Curtius' narrow escape is depicted on a relief , excavated in 1553 between the Column of Phocas and the Temple of Castor and Pollux , which seems to be a copy of an original dating perhaps to the 2nd century BC. Besides the story of Mettius Curtius, two other legends derive the name of the lacus from later Curtii. In one account,

360-587: The Renaissance , depicted by Paolo Veronese , Lucas Cranach the Elder , and many others. [REDACTED] Media related to Lacus Curtius (Rome) at Wikimedia Commons Curtia gens The gens Curtia was an ancient but minor noble family at Rome , with both patrician and plebeian branches. The only member of the gens invested with the consulship under the Republic was Gaius Curtius Philo, in 445 BC. A few Curtii held lesser magistracies during

400-627: The Republic are Peducaeanus, Philo , and Postumus . King of Rome The king of Rome ( Latin : rex Romae ) was the ruler of the Roman Kingdom . According to legend , the first king of Rome was Romulus , who founded the city in 753 BC upon the Palatine Hill . Seven legendary kings are said to have ruled Rome until 509 BC, when the last king was overthrown. These kings ruled for an average of 35 years. The kings after Romulus were not known to be dynasts and no reference

440-441: The consuls (the etymology suggests that these were originally the king's chief counsellors) and to the praetors ("leaders") after the creation of that office (about 367, according to Livy ); thereby at least roughly separating the judiciary from the executive. According to tradition (which is disputed by historians for the first decades), the consulate was always entrusted to two persons to prevent autocracy. In case of emergencies,

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480-492: The Curiate Assembly did have the power to pass laws that the king had submitted, the Senate was effectively an honorable council. It could advise the king on his action but, by no means, could prevent him from acting. The only thing that the king could not do without the approval of the Senate and Curiate Assembly was to declare war against a foreign nation. These issues effectively allowed the King to more or less rule by decree with

520-401: The King. The Curiate Assembly's vote only determined who was to be king, but that act did not bestow the powers of the king upon him. Accordingly, the king himself proposed to the Curiate Assembly a bill granting him imperium , and the Curiate Assembly, by voting in favour of the law, would grant it. In theory, the people of Rome elected their leader, but the Senate had most of the control over

560-688: The Lacus Curtius was named after a champion of the Sabines , the horseman Mettius Curtius. In the war that followed the Rape of the Sabine Women , he was said to have gotten stuck in the marsh during battle. This is corroborated by the fact that the Forum was once marshland, the fact that the Curtia Gens was of Sabine origin, and that the name Mettius was an authentic Sabine one taken from

600-628: The Republic, and there were two consuls suffectus in imperial times . However, the gens is best remembered from a series of legends dating from the traditional founding of the city to the early Republic. According to legend, Mettius Curtius was a leader of the Sabine forces who attacked Rome following the Rape of the Sabine Women . The first blows were exchanged between Curtius and the Roman warrior, Hostus Hostilius . After fierce fighting, Hostilius

640-406: The Senate's consent) another senator for another five-day term. This process would continue until the election of a new king. Once the interrex found a suitable nominee for the kingship, he would bring the nominee before the Senate and the Senate would examine him. If the Senate confirmed the nomination, the interrex would convene the Curiate Assembly and preside as its chairman during the election of

680-519: The area of religion, the king of sacrifices was formally, in all but protocol, subordinated to the first of the pontiffs , the pontifex maximus (whose position in origin, rather than with the name of priest, is better described as "minister of religion"), to the extent that at some point in history, the Regia or royal palace at the Forum Romanum, originally inhabited by the king of sacrifices,

720-435: The chasm whereupon the earth closed over him and Rome was saved. The story, though clearly epic in nature, was likely a copy of another very similar Greek story concerning king Midas . A bit to the east of the Lacus Curtius were found the skeletal remains of a man, woman, and child who had been bound together and drowned. This supports the notion that legends of Mettius and Marcus Curtius are perhaps warped recollections of

760-480: The city. The king was the sole person empowered to appoint patricians to the Senate. The king's imperium both granted him military powers and qualified him to pronounce legal judgement in all cases as the chief justice of Rome. Although he could assign pontiffs to act as minor judges in some cases, he had supreme authority in all cases brought before him, both civil and criminal. This made the king supreme in times of both war and peace. While some writers believed there

800-520: The consul Gaius Curtius Philo. The story of Mettius Curtius may shed some light on the origin of the Curtia gens; it implies that the Curtii were of Sabine origin. The consulship of Gaius Curtius Philo in 445 BC is one indication that the gens Curtia must have been patrician, since the consulship at that time was not open to plebeians. The family's appearance in the legends of the earliest period of Roman history also supports this identification, since

840-568: The empire, chief senators , and popular tribunes without the title. The republican idea that all promagisterial imperium ends upon entering the city was not observed in the emperors' case. At the same time, the legislation was practically passed from the Curiate Assembly to the Centuriate Assembly (and Tribal Assembly ), with the exception of the formality, more or less, of a lex curiata de imperio , which ratified

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880-415: The exception of the above-mentioned affairs. Whenever a Roman king died, Rome entered a period of interregnum . The supreme power in the state would be devolved to the Senate, which had the task of finding a new king. The Senate would assemble and appoint one of its own members as the interrex to serve for five days to nominate the next king of Rome. After the five days, the interrex could appoint (with

920-578: The family was not particularly illustrious in later times, making it unlikely that these stories were a later development, intended to flatter a powerful noble house. However, there were certainly plebeian Curtii; Gaius Curtius Peducaeanus was tribune of the plebs in 57 BC, indicating that a plebeian branch developed at some point. The Curtii are known to have used the praenomina Mettius , Gaius , Marcus , Gnaeus , Quintus , and Publius , all of which except Mettius were common throughout Roman history. The cognomina which occur in this gens under

960-402: The ground in the Forum gave way, and a youth named Marcus Curtius sacrificed himself by leaping in, fully armed and mounted on horseback, in order to fulfill a prophecy claiming that the chasm could be closed only by sacrificing that upon which Rome's future greatness would rest. The third legend states that the spot had been struck by lightning, and that on the Senate's orders, it was enclosed by

1000-470: The king was held for life and protected him from ever being brought to trial for his actions. As the sole holder of imperium in Rome at the time, the king possessed ultimate executive power and unchecked military authority as the commander-in-chief of all Rome's forces. His executive power and his sole imperium allowed him to issue decrees with the force of law. Also, the laws that kept citizens safe from

1040-464: The king would serve as high priest of Rome. An augur performed this ceremony by conducting the King-elect to the citadel where he was placed on a stone seat as the people waited below. If the King-elect was found worthy of the kingship, the augur announced that the gods had given favourable tokens, thus confirming the King-elect's priestly character. Second, the imperium had to be conferred upon

1080-418: The king. Once a candidate was proposed to the Curiate Assembly, the people of Rome could either accept or reject the King-elect. If accepted, the King-elect did not immediately take office: two additional acts had to take place before he was invested with the full regal authority and power. First, it was necessary to obtain the divine will of the gods respecting his appointment by means of the auspices , since

1120-453: The misuse of magistrates holding imperium did not exist during the time of the kings. The king was also empowered to appoint or nominate all officeholders. He would appoint a tribunus celerum to serve both as the tribune of Ramnes tribe in Rome and also as the commander of the king's personal bodyguard, the Celeres . The king was required to appoint the tribune upon entering office, and

1160-451: The office, patrician ancestry was necessary; however it was once performed by a member of a family otherwise known as plebeian , the Marcii , earning for himself and his descendants the cognomen Rex . As has been mentioned, the administrative functions in religion, including at some point the housing in the ancient royal court, were ceded to the supreme pontiff. In the late Republic,

1200-429: The power to appoint a dictator for a six-month term was introduced. Later, proconsuls and propraetors could be given an imperium by appointment of the Senate. Whoever used the imperium to victoriously lead an army could acquire the title of imperator , which later became chief title of the emperors, who were formally included in the system as proconsuls over most (and the strategically most important) parts of

1240-519: The previous role of the king in choosing new senators and dismissing people from the Senate was ceded to the censors . However, the role of choosing senators became rather limited as all magistrates down to the rank of quaestor eventually gained admission to the Senate after the office's expiration. The modern concept of a head of state, insofar as the republican times excepting the dictatorships are concerned, can hardly be translated to Roman conceptions , but most other powers—the imperium —were ceded to

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1280-472: The process. Since Rome's records were destroyed in 390 BC when the city was sacked , it is impossible to know for certain how many kings actually ruled the city, or if any of the deeds attributed to the individual kings, by later writers, are accurate. Titus Tatius , King of the Sabines, was also joint king of Rome with Romulus for five years, until his death. However, he is not traditionally counted among

1320-473: The ritual of driving a nail into the temple of Jupiter sometimes even induced a dictatorship. The rex sacrorum was not elected publicly, but chosen by the pontifical college. The king of sacrifices retained some religious rites only he could perform, and acted as quasi- flamen to Janus . The position seems to have continued in existence until the official adoption of the Christian religion. To qualify for

1360-441: The seven kings of Rome. The overthrow of the Roman monarchy of Tarquinius Superbus led to a limited separation of the powers mentioned above. The actual title of king was retained for the rex sacrorum , who formally remained Rome's first priest. He was forbidden any political or military career, except for a seat in the Senate. However, the Roman desire to prevent the kingship from becoming important went so far that, even in

1400-432: The tribune left office upon the king's death. The tribune was second in rank to the king and also possessed the power to convene the Curiate Assembly and lay legislation before it. Another officer appointed by the king was the custos urbis , who acted as the warden of the city. When the king was absent from the city, the prefect held all of the king's powers, even to the point of being bestowed with imperium while inside

1440-407: The word medìss "leader". A second version (~445 BCE), and also the most prosaic, says Gaius Curtius Philon, a consul , had consecrated the site after a lightning strike had hit it . The Lacus Curtius may have been regarded with some veneration by ancient Romans. The most popular story (~362 BCE), and also the one Livy deemed most likely, was a myth glorifying the nation: Rome was endangered when

1480-417: Was a weak oligarchy , capable of exercising only minor administrative powers, so that Rome was ruled by its king who was in effect an absolute monarch . The Senate's main function was to carry out and administer the wishes of the king. After Romulus, Rome's first legendary king, Roman kings were elected by the people of Rome, sitting as a Curiate Assembly , who voted on the candidate that had been nominated by

1520-410: Was ceded to the pontifex maximus . Significantly enough, one of his major public appearances was at the festival of Regifugium , where he impersonated the king being thrown out of the city. Further, the consuls retained religious roles which were considered so important that the office of interrex was retained for the opening prayer of "electional" assemblies in case both consuls died in office, and

1560-399: Was no appeal from the king's decisions, others believed that a proposal for appeal could be brought before the king by any patrician during a meeting of the Curiate Assembly . To assist the king, a council advised the king during all trials, but this council had no power to control the king's decisions. Also, two criminal detectives ( Quaestores Parricidii ) were appointed by him as well as

1600-474: Was slain and the Romans retreated, pursued by Curtius. Just then, the Roman King , Romulus , led his best troops against Curtius' advance. Pursued by the Romans, Curtius' horse was frightened by the shouting and plunged into the swamps, becoming mired in shallow water. Only with great effort was he able to free himself. Afterward, this stretch of water became known as the Lacus Curtius. In later times,

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