Should a citizen be wanted to appear before the king or the Senate, it was then an easy task to find the tribe to which he belonged and the region in which he dwelt.
Servius also made a law which pleased the Romans well, called an ordinance of the king.
This ordinance forbade the nobles to oppress the poor. It also decreed that, however lowly the birth of a Roman citizen, if he became rich he might hold positions of power in the State. This encouraged the poor man to be industrious, for if he could but gain wealth there was no ambition which he might not be able to satisfy.
But while the ordinance pleased the common people, it displeased the nobles, who had no wish to see the plebeians raised to positions which until now had been sacred to them and to their sons. They bore Servius no good will for passing this new law.
Trouble, too, was threatening the king through his two daughters, both of whom, as the Roman custom was, were named Tullia.
But although their names were the same, their natures were as different as summer is different from winter.
Tullia, the elder, was wicked and ambitious; Tullia, the younger, good and gentle.
Servius determined to marry his daughters to the sons of King Tarquinius, whose kindness had placed him on the throne.
The princes, as the princesses, were of strangely different natures. Lucius was proud, his temper violent; while Aruns was humble and good-natured.
Now the king thought that if the gentle Tullia married Lucius, he would become a better man; while he hoped that if his ambitious daughter married Aruns she would learn from him the grace of humility.