Page:A history and description of Roman political institutions (IA historyanddescri00abbo).pdf/17

Rh constituent elements mentioned above. It is important for us, however, to note certain parts of the story which can be established with certainty, or with a high degree of probability. We can, for instance, rely upon the fact that the original settlement out of which the city of Rome developed was made on the left bank of the Tiber, about fifteen miles from the mouth of the river. Some portions of the wall of the old Palatine settlement are still in situ, and from them the compass of the early city can be fairly well determined. Independent settlements existed on the Quirinal, the Esquiline, the Capitoline, and the Caelian also. These hills with the citadels upon them were places of refuge also, in case of necessity, for the settlers upon the adjacent plains, and at a very early date all these hill settlements were fused into a single city. The territory of this unified community was first extended, by conquest, to the south of the city, and along the left bank of the Tiber to its mouth. Tradition is undoubtedly right in dating expansion in this direction from the early part of the regal period.

7. Its Population. The various traditions connected with the founding of the city agree in stating that the population of Rome was divided into three parts. According to the commonly accepted form of the tradition, these three parts, the Ramnes, Tities, and Luceres, were independent elements of different origin, the Ramnes being the original settlers of Roma quadrata, the Tities a Sabine community, while the identity of the Luceres was a matter of as great uncertainty to the ancients as it is to us to-day. Some modern writers are inclined to accept this view of the case. Others find in the division of the community into three "tribes" only an instance of the adoption of a system of political organization which was not unknown to