The Kings of Rome

The dates on this plate were worked out centuries after the events they describe. They are built from Varro's founding year, 753 BC, and the reign lengths in Livy: thirty-seven years for Romulus, forty-three for Numa Pompilius, and so on to twenty-five for Tarquinius Superbus, with one year between Romulus and Numa. Livy's own total is 244 years from the founding of the city to its liberation. Other ancient writers give the Alban kings different names and orders, and the plate says so.

The tradition is full of legend, and the plate keeps its hedges. Romulus is said to have vanished in a storm and become a god. Numa gave Rome its priests and its calendar, guided, he claimed, by the goddess Egeria. Tullus Hostilius destroyed Alba Longa and is said to have been struck dead by lightning. In Livy's account, Ancus Marcius built the first bridge over the Tiber and founded Ostia; Tarquinius Priscus laid out the Circus Maximus; Servius Tullius held the first census and was murdered by Tarquin and his own daughter; and Tarquinius Superbus built the temple of Jupiter on the Capitol before he was driven out after his son's rape of Lucretia. Livy names Lucius Junius Brutus and Lucius Tarquinius Collatinus as the first consuls.