Page:Dio's Roman History, tr. Cary - Volume 1.djvu/85

Rh the priestesses who do not keep their chastity has continued to prevail. The men who dishonour them have their necks inserted in a forked pole in the Forum, and then are scourged naked until they perish. However, an attack was made upon Tarquinius by the sons of Marcius because he would not yield the sovereignty to them, but instead placed a certain Tullius, born to him by a slave woman, at the head of them all. This more than anything else displeased the patricians. The young men interested some of these in their cause, and then they fonned a plot against the king. They arrayed two men like rustics, equipped with axes and sickles, and made them ready to attack him. So these two, since they did not find Tarquinius in the Forum, came to the gates of the palace, pretending to have a dispute with each other, and asked for admission to his presence. Upon gaining their request they began to make opposing arguments, and while Tarquinius was giving his attention to one of them as he pleaded his cause, the other slew him.

9. Such was the end that befell Tarquinius after he had ruled for thirty-eight years. Nevertheless, the sons of Marcius did not possess themselves of the royal power, but Tullius gained it, through the cooperation of Tanaquil, the wife of Tarquinius. Tullius was the son of a certain woman named Ocrisia, who had been the wife of Spurius Tullius, a Latin, and had been captured in the war and set apart for Tarquinius; she had either become pregnant at home or conceived after her capture (both stories are current). When Tullius had at length reached