The professor in Janet's Latin class had them celebrate Rome"s birthday.

North_Fork_Trails said...
Ah yes, good old Rome, founded in 753 B.C. as tradition has it. Which is almost exactly when Greek colonies began to proliferate on the Italian peninsula and in Sicily. It is no accident that the Latin alphabet is derived from the Greek alpha, beta, ... .

In Plutarch we find interesting tales of the founding of Rome, in his Life of Romulus.

In Virgil's Aeneid, we find what traditionally happened just before the time of Romulus, immediately following the Trojan War. By this tradition, Rome arose from Trojan refugees. Perhaps, blurring our focus, we find the Romans wishing only to specify that they were *not* Greek, and, if anything, opposed to the Greeks.

Later, of course, by the time of Divus Julius, the Romans felt themselves much in the business of preserving and promulgating Greek culture. Sort of, "We Romans may not have the creative genius of the Greeks, but we know how to rule, and we will keep the Greek flame alive, through the centuries."

And they did ...
April 22, 2008 8:36 AM