Beginning notes of Rome and Quite a Story!

Latins (came first)
-descendants of Indo-Europeans
-settled on banks of the Tiber River
-situated so that trading ships could navigate as far as Rome, no further. (not war fleets)
-commercial port- not susceptible to attack
-built on seven hills, especially Palatine

Etruscans
-Came from the North
-metalworkers, architects, and artists
-foundation myths: Virgil's Aeneid (similar to the Odyssey)and Remus and Romulus

Greeks
-had colonies all over the Mediterranean Sea
-Romans borrowed ideas from them such as: their alphabet, religion, art, military techniques and weaponry

They drained a swamp...
-many streams flowed into the Tiber
-marshy area called the Forum between the Palatine and Capitoline Hills
-Tarquin the Proud's grandfather built the Cloaca Maxima (largest ancient drain) which channeled water into the Tiber
-Urban Legend- DC was built was on a swamp...only 2% was actually swampland

Lucius Tarquinias Superbus
-7th and final king of Rome
-known was Tarquin the Proud/Tarquin the Arrogant
-true tyrant
-The people's shock at his behavior and this horrible family made them NEVER want to be subject to the rule of kings EVER again- this was an attitude that lasted centuries