Demaratus of Corinth. | ---------------------------------------- | | TARQUINIUS PRISCUS. Aruns. | | -------------------------------------------- | | | | | | Tarquinia, Tarquinia, L. TARQUINIUS Aruns. Egerius, married married SUPERBUS. commander of Servius Tullius. M. Brutus. | Collatia. | | | ----------------- ------------------ | | | | | | | M. Brutus, L. Brutus, Titus. Sextus. Aruns. Tarquinius put to the Collatinus, death by Consul. married Tarquinius. Lucretia. ] [Footnote 11: The _Lictors_ were public officers who attended upon the Roman magistrate. Each consul had twelve lictors. They carried upon their shoulders _fasces_, which were rods bound in the form of a bundle, and containing an axe in the middle.] [Footnote 12: There is, however, reason to believe that these brilliant stories conceal one of the earliest and greatest disasters of the city. It appears that Rome was really conquered by Porsena, and lost all the territory which the kings had gained on the right side of the Tiber. Hence we find the thirty tribes, established by Servius Tullius, reduced to twenty after the war with Porsena.] [Footnote 13: The _Dictator_ was an extraordinary magistrate appointed by one of the Consuls in seasons of great peril. He possessed absolute power. Twenty-four lictors attended him, bearing the axes in the fasces, even in the city; and from his decision there was no appeal. He could not hold the office longer than six months, and he usually laid it down much sooner. He appointed a _Magister Equitum_, or Master of the Horse, who acted as his lieutenant. From the time of the appointment of the Dictator, all the other magistrates, even the Consuls, ceased to exercise any power.] [Illustration: The Campagna of Rome.] CHAPTER IV. FROM THE BATTLE OF THE LAKE REGILLUS TO THE DECEMVIRATE. B.C. 498-451. The history of Rome for the next 150 years consists internally of the struggles between the Patricians and Plebeians, and externally of the wars with the Etruscans, Volscians, AEquians, and other tribes in the immediate neighborhood of Rome.