The overthrow of the Roman monarchy was an event in ancient Rome that took place between the 6th and 5th centuries BC where a political revolution replaced the then-existing Roman monarchy under Lucius Tarquinius Superbus with a republic. The details of the event were largely forgotten by the Romans a few centuries later; later Roman historians presented a narrative of the events, traditionally dated to c. 509 BC, but it is largely believed by modern scholars to be fictitious.
The traditional account portrays a dynastic struggle in which the king's second son, Sextus Tarquinius, rapes a noblewoman, Lucretia. Upon revealing the assault to some Roman noblemen, she kills herself. The Roman noblemen, led by Lucius Junius Brutus, obtain the support of the Roman aristocracy and the people to expel the king and his family and create a republic. The Roman army, supporting Brutus, forces the king into exile. Despite a number of attempts by Lucius Tarquinius Superbus to reinstate the monarchy, the Roman people are successful in establishing a republic and thereafter elected two consuls annually to rule the city.
Many modern scholars dismiss this narrative as fictitious. There does not exist, however, any concrete evidence for or against it. Various scholars have dismissed aspects of the traditional story, from the historicity of almost all of its major characters to the overthrow's entire existence.
Chronology
Scholars and the ancient sources themselves disagree on when the monarchy was overthrown and how old the resulting republic was. The most well-known date for the establishment of the republic, and therefore, the expulsion of the kings, is 509 BC. The specific dating to 509 BC emerges from the Varronian chronology, assembled during the late republic by Marcus Terentius Varro and later used by the fasti Capitolini, which likely – in the earlier period – runs four years behind the actual dates (i.e. Varronian year 344 corresponds to real year 340 BC).
The simplest way for the Romans to have inferred the age of their republic would have been to look at the list of consuls, of which two were elected every year, and count the number of consular pairs to surmise that the republic had existed for however many years corresponded. The fasti Capitolini – relying on the Varronian chronology – go back to 509 BC; Livy's list of consuls points to the republic having begun around 502–1 BC. Of course, this would have relied on the lists of consuls being accurate. Later historians reported dates roughly around that time, implying that the republic was founded:
- according to Dionysius of Halicarnassus, in the first year of the 68th Olympiad or the year Isagoras was eponymous archon at Athens (implying 508–7 BC),
- according to Polybius, 28 years before Xerxes crossed into Greece (implying 508 BC), or
- according to a census in 389 or 388 BC, 119 years before it (implying 508 or 507 BC),
A further account is given by Gnaeus Flavius, who asserted his temple to Concordia was dedicated 204 years after the dedication of the capitol. Because his temple was dedicated in 303 BC, this implies the capitol – which traditionally was held to have been dedicated in the first year of the republic – was dedicated in 507.
However, modern scholars are sceptical of much of this traditional chronology, especially that related to the dedication of the capitol. This relates mainly to debate over whether the earlier entries on the consular fasti are fabrications. Many historians have argued that the fasti are an unreliable anachronism of the late republic. Resolution of this topic is difficult, however, due to the absolute paucity of reliable sources such that – as the historian Fred Drogula remarks – "we have no way to prove or disprove most of the information contained [in the fasti]".
Traditional account
Roman tradition held that there were seven kings of Rome who reigned from the city's founding (traditionally dated to 753 BC) by Romulus up to the reign of Tarquin. Archaeological evidence indicates there were kings in Rome; but most scholars do not believe that the traditional narrative is historical, ascribing its characters and details to later literary invention.
Account
According to the traditional account, a group of aristocrats overthrow the last king, Lucius Tarquinius Superbus, in response to the rape of the noblewoman Lucretia by the king's second son, Sextus Tarquinius; after revealing the rape to some noblemen, Lucretia commits suicide. The resulting outrage leads to an uprising against the ruling family, led by some of the king's relatives: Lucius Junius Brutus (the king's nephew), Lucius Tarquinius Collatinus (the king's cousin and Lucretia's husband), and Spurius Lucretius Tricipitinus (Lucretia's father). They are also joined by an influential friend, Publius Valerius Poplicola.
During this time, Tarquin has been conducting a war against Ardea, but rushes back to Rome on news of the coup; however, the city is shut before him and the coup leaders convince the army at Ardea to join them, leading to the expulsion of the king's sons. Brutus and Collatinus then become the first consuls – though in this early period they were called praetores (deriving from "leader") – with Brutus administering an oath before the people to never again tolerate a king in Rome and to kill anyone who attempts to restore the monarchy. He also proposes the banishment of all members of the Tarquin clan, leading to the banishment of his colleague Collatinus, who is replaced in office by Poplicola.
Soon after, Brutus' two sons, brothers of Brutus' wife, the Vitellii, the Aquilii, and relatives of Collatinus are discovered plotting to restore the monarchy. After the conspiracy is exposed by a slave, Brutus orders the death of his own sons and relatives. Meanwhile, Tarquin flees to Etruria and persuades various cities there to attack Rome and restore him to the throne. They are unsuccessful and defeated at the Battle of Silva Arsia, where Brutus falls in battle; Poplicola then returns to celebrate a triumph for victory over the Etruscans. Tarquin then requests aid from Lars Porsenna, the king of Clusium, who marches on Rome but is stopped by Horatius Cocles who defends a bridge alone against Porsenna's forces until it can be demolished. The heroism of the republic's youths and Rome's force of arms persuade Porsenna to give up his campaign.
Tarquin then appeals to his son-in-law, Octavius Mamilius of Tusculum, who mobilises the Latin League against Rome, until they too are defeated at the Battle of Lake Regillus (with the Romans receiving divine assistance from Castor and Pollux). With no more allies willing to attack the Romans, Tarquin leaves for a more permanent exile in Cumae before dying in 495 BC. The Roman government then falls into the hands of a group of aristocratic families, the patricians, who then elect magistrates from among their number, setting up conditions for the so-called Conflict of the Orders.
Development
The traditional account is likely derived from an earlier oral tradition. Barthold Georg Niebuhr, in the early nineteenth century, posited that the oral tradition may have been transmitted by poems sung or recited by bards at banquets during the republic. While this "ballad theory" is no longer widely accepted, T. P. Wiseman has more recently argued that the stories were transmitted by means of public performance of plays dramatising historical events. Such plays would be especially important in a society with low literacy, and are perhaps supported by archaeological evidence suggesting circulation of Greek myths and stories in Italy as far back as the archaic period. Attilio Mastrocinque, in A companion to Livy, for example, identifies Lucius Accius's tragedy Brutus as a source for some of the stories transmitted via Livy.
The sources we have today for the monarchy and the earliest parts of the republic are "notorious[ly] unreliable" literary sources: Livy, Dionysius of Halicarnassus, along with some supporting work from Plutarch's Life of Poplicola. The first literary history in Rome was written by Quintus Fabius Pictor c. 200 BC, centuries after the actual fall of the monarchy. These ancient historians read the fragmentary evidence from early Rome and reconstructed it such that it reflected their present and the surviving accounts of Livy and others are based on these writers rather than the original evidence. Thus:
Most scholars now agree that as a result of this process the details of Livy's political and military narrative are unreliable, amounting to reconstruction or plausible invention by Livy himself or by his sources.
Similarly,
Few can now doubt that earlier times tended, both consciously and unconsciously, to be re-created by a succession of Roman writers in light of the conditions in the third and second century. This was true even before [133 BC and] a new political climate in which historians had more urgent motives to project the [contemporaneous] political concerns and conflicts [on] earlier Roman history.
The stories that were written down by the time of the second century BC were done so by a time the Romans had lost any reliable sources on the fall of the monarchy; the purpose of that history as well was not to record the past in its terms, but for senators to describe and celebrate the republic as it existed in their time. Senatorial historiography served to advertise and embellish writers' families rather than describe political or social contexts already lost from memory. For example, T. P. Wiseman argues that many of the kings themselves and figures from the traditional story were ahistorical inventions of the fourth and third centuries BC. Wiseman and the more critical historians similarly dismiss even the earliest Roman historians, such as Fabius Pictor, as having had little knowledge of their own past beyond the fourth century BC. Other scholars go further, such as James Richardson, who believes that one of the central figures of the traditional story, Lucius Junius Brutus, "never existed".
As to the sources of the early republic generally, scholars usually accept the timing and occurrence of major events such as laws or battles. The narratives and details of the early republic are, therefore, doubtful even as the events are accepted in their most general terms. These difficulties are especially challenging when there is little middle ground between a critical reading of the sources and blind acceptance of self-contradictory and unsatisfactory sources: reconstructing the earliest parts of the republic based on a critical reading "runs the risk of simply producing [a] modern narrative with no basis at all in the evidence".
Much of the traditional narratives given from the ancient sources are distrusted by modern scholars, who especially note how ancient sources borrowed literary tropes to embellish sparse details – even if those details are accepted in terms of basic events such as the deposition of a corrupt and ineffective tyrant – from a fragmentary tradition.
Inconsistencies
By the time of Fabius Pictor, it seems the tales of the monarchy and its overthrow were already well developed. Many of the legendary events bear uncanny similarities to Greek tales: the rape of Lucretia perhaps being an adaptation of a similar affair which led to the expulsion of the Peisistratid tyranny in Athens also c. 510 BC. Moreover, sexual violence against innocent and virtuous young women was a common trope characterising tyrants and bad kings in ancient literature. Furthermore, the depiction of Collatinus' exile may be paralleled on the ostracism of Hipparchos, son of Peisistratus, and Tarquinius' war on Rome to retain his crown a parallel to Darius' attempt to restore the last Peisistratid tyrant to power in Athens. The extent, however, to which these Roman tales are copies of Greek tales or are genuine Roman tales embellished with Greek details is hotly debated.
The historian Tim Cornell makes the point that "as a dynastic history[,] the bare catalogue of events within the Tarquin family is, in itself, perfectly credible". Yet, it is only that dynastic history which is credible. The parts around it are less compatible: a palace coup orchestrated by possible royal claimants "sits rather uncomfortably with the notion [that the uprising was] inspired by republican ideals". The hatred of the Tarquinii is also incompatible with the election of Collatinus (a patrilineal member of the Tarquinii) and of Lucius Junius Brutus (related to the Tarquinii maternally). The intervention and defeat of Lars Porsenna also is questionable; other ancient accounts place him as defeating the nascent republic and imposing harsh peace terms.