1) How It Was (昔日图景)

Early spring, 800 BC. The Palatine Hill. Before dawn, mist climbs slowly from the Tiber, clinging to the low-lying grass, only to halt at the slope as if checked by an invisible boundary. A wooden door is pushed open with a brief, restrained creak. A man steps out onto soil packed firm by countless footsteps; he does not hesitate. He checks the boundary stone first, then the livestock. The stone remains unmoved; the sheep are all accounted for. The wind sweeps across the slope, carrying a damp, cold scent. The fields here are not vast—irregular plots of land unfolding with the contour of the hill. The grain has not yet headed, its hue dark and somber, as if yet to wake from winter. The man stoops to inspect the earth, rubbing a pinch of soil between his fingers to judge its moisture. He needs no ledgers or plans; these motions have been repeated in his body too many times. The land appears quiet today, and that is enough. Inside, the hearth is rekindled. A woman leans over to blow; embers flare briefly and settle into a steady glow. The stone mill begins to turn, its sound low and rhythmic, like the steady pulse of time drawn taut. When the children are woken, they are still heavy with sleep, but they already know their tasks—tending the sheep, gathering wood, and keeping an eye on movements on the opposite hills. No one explains why; here, explanation is superfluous.

Daylight unfolds slowly. Sunlight hits the slopes but fails to truly warm the air. The fields look peaceful, but this peace is more a pause than a promise. While working, a shield rests against a tree and a spear is thrust into the soil, positioned exactly where a hand might reach them in an instant. Figures move on the opposite hills—blurred silhouettes, discernible only by the rhythm of their labor. They are familiar with one another, yet never entirely trusting. At noon, as shadows shorten, several households gather. Someone mends a fence; others exchange low-voiced news: which path was recently trodden, whether the water source has changed, or if any sounds unbelonging to this land were heard in the night. Words are few, and no one seeks to draw conclusions. All understand: a single household cannot endure alone, yet staying too close invites trouble. This balance is found through trial and error, time and again. Evening arrives abruptly. Cooking smoke rises on the slopes only to be scattered by the wind. In a corner of the house, a simple offering is set—to ancestors, to the land, and to those nameless powers mentioned repeatedly. This is not a plea for miracles, but a confirmation: the family remains, the land remains, and today, that invisible line was not crossed. As night falls, lights on the Palatine flicker to life one by one, eventually steadying. The wind from the river valley rises with the damp, making one wrap their garments tighter. Fires light up on the opposite hills, echoing one another, yet remaining isolated.

In the 8th century BC, the Palatine did not know it "belonged to the Seven Hills." It was merely one of many hills in central Latium: not the tallest, nor the steepest, but situated precisely at the crossroads of several routes. Below lay the humid but inevitable lowlands; outward lay other hill settlements, equally vigilant and dispersed. Each hill was an independent world, guarding its land, livestock, and ancestral memories. In the Latium of the 8th century BC, there was no city called "Rome." Latium sat between the Apennines and the Tyrrhenian Sea—a landscape of interlocking hills, valleys, and plains, neither enclosed nor prominent. The Tiber flowed through this land, providing water and passage but not yet dominating it. People lived scattered across visible yet independent heights, of which the Palatine was one. Archaeology shows that Iron Age pastoral-agricultural settlements existed here in the 9th to 8th centuries BC: elliptical huts, ash pits, and post-hole remains indicate that people lived in family units, sustaining themselves through herding and simple farming. The hilltops facilitated observation of the valley and surroundings, utilizing water while avoiding lowland floods and ambushes. Between these hills, there was no common authority—only recurring contact, avoidance, and friction.

Between these hills lay a low-lying marsh, flooded in the rainy season and damp with stagnant air—unfit for habitation or defense. This valley, later known as the Roman Forum, was initially only a site for passing livestock, material exchange, and chance encounters. As population grew, conflicts that might have been dissolved by distance began to recur here. To make this "no-man's land" repeatedly usable, people began to construct drainage ditches, eventually developing into the grand drainage system known as the Cloaca Maxima. This project took place during the late Regal period (7th to 6th centuries BC). Its significance lay not just in technology, but in the fact that, for the first time, people invested long-term, irreversible construction costs into land that "belonged to no single hill." The lowlands thus became a sustainable public space where rituals, exchanges, and witnessing occurred repeatedly. A shared "center" was manufactured through engineering rather than proclaimed by decree.

By the 6th century BC, the interaction, collaboration, and dependence among the Seven Hills had become the reality of urban life, yet it still lacked clear boundaries. External threats were no longer directed at a single hill but at the entire settlement area. Thus, the defensive system traditionally associated with Servius Tullius began to emerge—the later Servian Wall. The wall did not create the city; rather, it followed existing trajectories of life, incorporating the Seven Hills into a single defensive line. Tuff was cut from nearby quarries, and trenches and earthen mounds were deployed alongside the terrain, fixing the pre-existing settlement reality. The emergence of the wall marked the recognition of a fact: this agglomeration of hills—formed through repeated contact, shared lowlands, and the gradual formation of public space—had become a community requiring collective protection. The so-called "Seven Hills" and "Rome" were not names that preceded entities; they were the results forced out by time through long-term engineering, contact, and repetition.

2) Romulus (罗慕路斯)

During the time of Romulus (c. 750 BC), the various hills later known as the "Seven Hills" remained independent. Each had its own settlement, agricultural range, and defensive methods; daily life revolved around the family and small communities. The distances between them were not great, yet they were not short enough to naturally form a union; conversely, this proximity was accompanied by competition and friction over land, water, and passage rights. Neighboring hills were both potential partners and sources of constant tension. Romulus's place in history is less that of a ruler and more that of a "foundational figure" fixed by later generations. Traditional chronology places his activities in the mid-8th century BC, but at this time, Rome did not exist as a unified city. In such a structural condition, Romulus could not have ruled the Seven Hills as an institutionalized "King"; he was likely just an early hill chieftain centered on the Palatine, maintaining influence through personal prestige, force, and a religious-arbitral role.

The title "First King of Rome" is itself a retrospective designation. It does not reflect the political reality of Romulus's era, but rather the result of a mature city-state seeking a clear starting point after the fact. The narratives of his birth, the founding of the city, and the slaying of his brother are political myths designed to compress a complex formative process into a memorable, narratable origin. In the stage Romulus inhabited, power resided not in institutions, but in who could consistently solve problems. His "daily life" determined how he became a strongman. His activities were, first and foremost, military. As a leader in the Palatine area, he needed to organize defenses, lead conflicts, and distribute spoils. In an environment of independent hills and frequent friction, whoever survived, won, and stabilized the aftermath naturally gained followers. A strongman was not elected; he was confirmed through constant conflict.

Secondly, he had to assume the role of an arbitrator. Land boundaries, grazing routes, and internal disputes were daily occurrences. In the absence of written law or standing institutions, resolving disputes relied on personal prestige and immediate judgment. A person who could make both parties to a conflict temporarily accept a ruling would be repeatedly pushed into the position of "the one to seek next time." Power here was not a command, but a repeated invocation. Thirdly, Romulus needed to preside over religious and ritual acts. This was not an ancillary role but a core function. In early Latin society, religion was not a belief system but a tool of order. Presiding over sacrifices, oaths, and boundary-marking rituals meant confirming the boundaries and continuity of the community. Whoever stood at the center of the ritual was seen as "the one representing us." Finally, he assumed the function of absorption and integration. The narratives of "sheltering outsiders" and "expanding the population" reflected a pragmatic strategy: in the competitive environment of the hills, gathering more fighting men meant expanding one's survival space. It was in these repetitive and concrete daily affairs that Romulus evolved from a hill chieftain into the figure to whom people turned "if things got serious." He did not build a city-state or design a system, but the roles he played—military leader, center of arbitration, ritual presider, and point of integration—constituted the prototype of later kingship.

Romulus became a strongman not because he proclaimed himself king, but because in a world without stable structures, he took on the most difficult, dangerous, and irreplaceable work. When later generations looked back and required a starting point, this repeatedly confirmed "strongman" was naturally straightened into the "First King." The myth provides a prototype: Romulus and his twin Remus, born of a vestal virgin and Mars, abandoned in the Tiber, suckled by a wolf, and eventually returning to found a city where they were saved. The slaying of Remus for leaping over the city boundary marks a defining moment: the city boundary was established as sacred and inviolable. Romulus established Rome, offered asylum to outsiders, and eventually vanished in a storm to become the god Quirinus. This story does not try to prove Romulus was "good" or even "human"; it gives Rome a prototype of a city that began with abandonment, was shaped by boundaries and conflict, and grew through absorption.

In the Rome of the 8th century BC, there were no written records for us to rely on. All accounts of Romulus come from authors centuries later, such as Livy and Plutarch. This means these records are not contemporary logs but the results of later organization, retrospection, and reconstruction. From an archaeological perspective, confirmed facts are limited. Remains of huts and hearths exist, but they do not prove the existence of a ruler with institutional power. In modern historiography, Romulus is seen more as a name compressed by later generations to represent the transition from scattered villages to an early town. He represents a time-node and a process of transformation rather than a ruler whose policies can be verified. Romulus was preserved for his narrative function: the Republic needed an origin, the Regal sequence needed a first link, and collective memory needed a personified source. Modern history does not simply deny the myth but limits its use: scholars accept Romulus's place in tradition but no longer treat specific actions or institutions as verifiable historical facts.

3) The Disappearance of Romulus (罗慕路斯的消失)

In early Rome, and the broader Italo-Etruscan cultural sphere, space did not automatically possess the legitimacy of a city. A piece of land did not become a city simply by being occupied; a gathering of people did not equal divine approval. The legitimacy of a city required confirmation through a set of religious procedures, with augury as the critical starting step. Augury was an authorization mechanism: it asked not "will this succeed?" but "does the god permit the establishment of order in this space?" In this logic, the boundary became the decisive factor. The city boundary established through the ritual furrow (sulcus primigenius) was not just a physical line but a mark of the redefinition of space.

In the legend, Remus is killed for leaping over the boundary. The key was not his attitude, but that he crossed the sacred line just established by ritual. If this boundary could be mocked, the founding ritual would be rendered void, and the city’s foundation would crumble. Crossing this line first meant denying the divine will confirmed by augury; secondly, it blurred the fundamental distinction between "inside the city" and "outside the city." Inside the city, stable laws, rituals, and order applied because it was severed from the state of nature, war, and violence. Once the boundary failed, the city would slide back into the same state as the outside. As this concept became institutionalized, the city boundary evolved into the pomerium. Within the pomerium, space was defined by special religious attributes. Human actions were no longer just personal or familial but part of an order shared by gods and men. Time-keeping, marriage, death, and judgment all gained a religious dimension. Therefore, the city was not just a "safer place," but a space explicitly incorporated into a sacred order.

In Roman narrative, Romulus's end is deliberately handled as a "disappearance" rather than a death: while speaking at a public assembly, a storm erupted, and after it cleared, Romulus was gone. It was announced he had been taken to heaven to become the god Quirinus. This was a highly functional political-religious narrative. Romulus’s exit had to be precisely controlled because it directly concerned the source of Rome’s legitimacy. If Romulus had died at human hands—whether by assassination or coup—it would imply that the founder could be negated. It would reinterpret the city's origin as a failed personal rule rather than an approved beginning of order. If he were overthrown, the founding authority itself would be revocable. Thus, only one narrative was "safe": ascension. By declaring Romulus as Quirinus, the act of founding was removed from human power systems and returned to the sacred realm. The founding was sealed as a completed state: unalterable, unaccountable, and unrepeatable.

After Romulus disappeared, Rome did not immediately choose a successor but entered an Interregnum. This was not a passive power vacuum, but a conscious "de-sacralized buffer zone." Power was temporarily returned to the Senate, handled in a highly procedural, "cooled-down" manner. Senators took turns ruling (interrex) for only a few days each. This design prevented any single individual from forming sustained authority. The goal was risk management: preventing a return to tribal violence and searching for a person who would not replicate Romulus. Rome needed a ruler who could bring the city into normalcy. If the second king were a Roman, it would be seen as a victory for one faction; if the successor were an outsider, he would not be embedded in any Roman network of blood or merit. Kingship was thus "de-factionalized."Numa Pompilius, as a Sabine, was "outsider" enough to avoid Roman factions, yet "related" enough to be accepted. The Sabines were a mountain people from the Apennines northeast of Rome. Their geography shaped their social traits: agricultural, conservative, and focused on stability. The legend of the "Rape of the Sabine Women" reflects this early tension and integration. The Sabines were not strange others, but part of the early Roman community's composition, yet positioned outside the urban system. This "near-but-not-inside" position was the pragmatic basis for Numa being chosen as the second king.

4) The Roman Calendar (罗马历法)

Before Numa, religious authority was highly personalized: who communicated with the gods depended on personal prestige or merit. Numa's key move was to depersonalize the ability to "communicate with the gods" and transform it into a stable institutional division of labor. He established the Pontifex Maximus. This figure was not a spokesperson for the gods, but an adjudicator of religious order. What was "correct" or "void" was no longer decided by the individual performing the ritual, but by a publicly recognized authority. This step cut off the subjective path of "I feel the god has accepted" and established the objective judgment of "does this conform to public standards." Religious acts thus gained an auditable quality.

Numa also established the Flamines (priests) and Augures (augurs). The Flamines were highly specialized; each served a specific deity (Jupiter, Mars, Quirinus). They were not "pious believers" but institutional interfaces for specific gods. This one-god-one-office design cut off room for personal interpretation. To ensure stability, their rituals, dress, and taboos were strictly fixed. The Flamen's personal life was incorporated into institutional control—limitations on travel, dress, and behavior ensured they remained in a stable state of readiness.

If the Flamines were responsible for "treating the gods correctly," the Augures handled the question: "is this action permitted at this moment?" They judged whether an action had divine permission through natural omens (birds, lightning). Crucially, Augures did not judge the content of the action, nor were they responsible for the outcome. They only answered "can it be done now?" An action could be politically sound but religiously forbidden. This created a cold distinction: legitimacy and success were two different things. Failure was no longer an affront to the gods, provided the procedure was correct.

Numa also created the Roman Calendar. Before Numa, months were not a unified system but a collection of agricultural and military markers. Traditionally, the Roman year began in March (Martius), named after Mars, marking the start of war and public action. Months like April (Aprilis - opening), May (Maius - growth), and June (Junius - Juno/social order) followed. However, from the fifth month on, naming shifted to numbers (Quintilis, Sextilis, September, etc.). This "de-mythologization" showed that the Romans prioritized administrative convenience over symbolic expression.

Numa reportedly introduced January and February to expand the year to twelve months. January (Ianuarius), from Janus, the god of thresholds, marked time as an object for institutional processing. February (Februarius), from the purification rite februa, was a window for cleansing and correction. Early Roman years were roughly 355 days, deviating from the solar year not out of ignorance, but by choice. The calendar prioritized religious "acceptability" over astronomical precision. Odd numbers were seen as lucky; even numbers as unstable. Corrections were made not through math, but by inserting an intercalary month at the religious authority's discretion. The calendar cared not for the "real world" date, but for which stage the city was "permitted" to enter.

Numa died naturally after a long reign. His death triggered no upheaval, as the institutions he built were now independent of his person. He was not deified or taken to heaven like Romulus; he was remembered as a man who "completed his task." His legacy was a self-sustaining religious-institutional structure. In the Roman value system, this was the highest possible evaluation: he ended as a man, but the order he established truly began to exist independently of man.