Romulus

Romulus , in Roman legend, founder of Rome. When Amulius usurped the throne of his brother Numitor, king of Alba Longa , he forced Numitor's daughter, Rhea Silvia, to become a vestal virgin so that she would bear no children. However, she became the mother of twin sons, Romulus and Remus, by the god Mars. Amulius then imprisoned Rhea Silvia and set the infants adrift in a basket on the Tiber. They floated safely ashore, where a she-wolf suckled and tended them until the royal shepherd Faustulus and his wife, Acca Larentia, found and reared them. When they were grown, the brothers learned their true identity, killed Amulius, and restored Numitor to the throne. They then decided to establish a city of their own where they had been first rescued from the Tiber. When Romulus was chosen by an omen as the true founder of the new city, strife arose between the brothers, and Romulus killed Remus. He then populated his city with fugitives from other countries; to get wives he and his fellow Romans abducted the women of the neighboring Sabine tribe (see Sabines ). After a long reign, Romulus disappeared in a thunderstorm and was thereafter worshiped as the god Quirinus . Roman historians traditionally set the date of Rome's founding at 753 BC

Romulus and Remus In Roman mythology, founders of Rome. Twin brothers, they were said to be sons of Mars. Amulius, who usurped the throne, ordered the babies to be drowned in the Tiber. They survived and were suckled by a wolf, before being found by a shepherd, Faustulus. They built a city on the site of their rescue. Romulus killed Remus during a quarrel.

Romulus the legendary founder of Rome, one of the twin sons of Mars by the Vestal Virgin Rhea Silvia; he and his brother Remus were exposed at birth in a basket on the River Tiber but were found and suckled by a she-wolf and later brought up by a shepherd family.

Grown to manhood, the twins founded a new settlement on the spot at which they had been washed ashore from the Tiber. An augury in the form of a flight of birds indicated that Romulus should be king, but during the building of the walls of Rome the brothers quarrelled, and Remus was killed.

The new city was settled by Romulus. To find wives for his followers, Romulus is said to have invited the neighbouring Sabines to witness a spectacle; in the course of this, the Sabine women were carried off (the Rape of the Sabines). The fighting which followed was eventually settled without the women returning to their own people.