(BOOK 1, BOISSEVAIN.)
Frag. 1VII, 1.—Æneas after the Trojan war came to the Aborigines, who were the former inhabitants of the land wherein Rome has been built and at that time had Latinus, the son of Faunus, as their sovereign. He came ashore at Laurentum, by the mouth of the river Numicius, where in obedience to some oracle he is said to have made preparations to dwell.
The ruler of the land, Latinus, interfered with Æneas's settling in the land, but after a sharp struggle was defeated. Then in accordance with dreams that appeared to both leaders they effected a reconciliation and the king beside permitting Æneas to reside there gave him his daughter Lavinia in marriage. Thereupon Æneas founded a city which he named Lavinium and the country was called Latium and the people there were termed Latins. But the Rutuli who occupied adjoining territory had been previously hostile to the Latins, and now they set out from the city of Ardea with warlike demonstrations. They had the support of no less distinguished a man than Turnus, a relative of Latinus, who had taken a dislike to Latinus because of Lavinia's marriage, for it was to him that the maiden had originally been promised. A battle took place, Turnus and Latinus fell, and Æneas gained the victory and his father-in-law's kingdom as well. After a time, however, the Rutuli secured the Etruscans as allies and marched upon Æneas. They won in this war. Æneas vanished, being seen no more alive or dead, and was honored as a god by the Latins. Hence he has come to be regarded by the Romans as the fountain head of their race and they take pride in being called "Sons of Æneas." The Latin domain fell in direct succession to his son Ascanius who had accompanied his father from home. Æneas had not yet had any child by Lavinia, but left her pregnant. Ascanius was enclosed round about by the enemy, but by night the Latins attacked them and ended both the siege and the war.
As time went on the Latin nation increased in size, and the majority of the people abandoned Lavinium to build another town in a better location. To it they gave the name of Alba from its whiteness and from its length they called it Longa (or, as Greeks would say, "white" and "long").
At the death of Ascanius the Latins gave the preference in the matter of royal power to the son borne to Æneas by Lavinia over the son of Ascanius, their preference being founded on the fact that Latinus was his grandfather. The new king's name was Silvius. Silvius begat Æneas, from Æneas sprang Latinus, and Latinus was succeeded by Pastis. Tiberinus, who came subsequently to be ruler, lost his life by falling into a river called the Albula. This river was renamed Tiber from him. It flows through Rome and is of great value to the city and in the highest degree useful to the Romans. Amulius, a descendant of Tiberinus, displayed an overweening pride and had the audacity to deify himself, pretending an ability to answer thunder with thunder by mechanical contrivances and to lighten in response to the lightnings and to hurl thunderbolts. He met his end by the overflow of the lake beside which his palace was set, and both he and the palace were submerged in the sudden rush of waters. Aventinus his son perished in warfare.
So far the account concerns Lavinium and the people of Alba. At the beginning of Roman history we see Numitor and Amulius, who were grandsons of Aventinus and descendants of Æneas.
(BOOK 2, BOISSEVAIN.)
B.C. 672
(a.u. 82)VII, 6.—When Numa died leaving no successor, Tullus Hostilius was chosen by the people and the senate. He followed in the footsteps of Romulus, and both welcomed combats himself and encouraged the people to do the same. The Albanians having become the victims of a marauding expedition on the part of the the Romans, both sides proceeded into battle; before they came into actual conflict, however, they effected a reconciliation and both races decided to dwell together in one city. Frag. 62but as each clung to his own town and insisted that the other race should remove to it, they failed of their object. next they disputed about the leadership. As neither one would yield it to the other, Frag. 62they arranged to have a contest for the sovereignty. They did not care to fight with entire armies nor yet to let the decision be made by a duel of champions. But there were on both sides brethren born three at a birth, the offspring of twin mothers, of like age and alike in strength: the Roman brethren were called Publihoratii and the Albanian Curiatii. These they set into battle over against one another, paying no heed to their relationship. So they, having armed themselves and having arrayed themselves in opposing files in the vacant space between the camps, called upon the same family gods and cast repeated glances upward at the sun. Having joined issue they fought now in groups, now in pairs. Finally, when two of the Romans had fallen and all of the Albanians had been wounded, the remaining Horatius, because he could not withstand the three at once, even were he unwounded, gave way in order that in pursuing him they might be scattered. And when they had become separated in the pursuit, Frag. 62attacking each one he despatched them all. Then he was given honors. But because he further killed his sister when she lamented on seeing Horatius carrying the spoils of her cousins, he was tried for murder; and having taken an appeal to the people he was released.
The Albanians now became subjects of the Romans, but later they disregarded the compact; and having been summoned, in their capacity of subjects, to serve as allies, they attempted at the crisis of the battle to desert to the enemy and to join in the attack upon the Romans. They were detected, however, and punished: many (including their leader, Mettius) were put to death, and the rest suffered deportation; their city Alba was razed to the ground, after being deemed for five hundred years the mother city of the Romans.