Faustulus and Acca Larentia adopted and raised the infant twins Romulus and Remus after Faustulus discovered them being nursed by the she-wolf at the Lupercal.
Hersilia, a Sabine woman seized during the mass abduction, became the wife of Romulus and bore him a daughter Prima and a son Aollius.
⚠ Dionysius of Halicarnassus (Antiquitates Romanae 3.1) names Hersilia as wife of Hostus Hostilius rather than Romulus, a variant Plutarch also notes.
Mars visited the Vestal Virgin Rhea Silvia and fathered the twins Romulus and Remus, who would go on to found Rome.
After vanishing in a storm on the Campus Martius, Romulus was deified as the god Quirinus. He appeared to Proculus Julius commanding the Romans to worship him under this name.
⚠ The Romulus-Quirinus identification dominates literary sources (Livy, Ovid, Plutarch), but Servius and Varro identify Quirinus as a peaceful aspect of Mars, and Dumézil argued Quirinus was an independent archaic deity predating the Romulus legend.
Numitor revealed the twins' true parentage to Romulus and Remus, and together they conspired to overthrow the usurper Amulius and restore Numitor to the throne of Alba Longa.
Before their fatal dispute, Remus and Romulus cooperated as twin leaders, raiding cattle, gathering followers among the Palatine shepherds, and jointly overthrowing the usurper Amulius.
After the Sabine women brokered peace, Romulus and Titus Tatius ruled Rome jointly as co-kings. Their partnership merged the Roman and Sabine peoples into a single community until Tatius's death.
Jupiter served as divine guardian of Romulus and the Roman state. As Jupiter Stator, he halted the Roman army's rout during Romulus's battle against the Sabines, and as Jupiter Optimus Maximus he remained supreme protector of Rome thereafter.
The Lupa nursed the infant twins Romulus and Remus at the Lupercal cave after they were cast into the Tiber, keeping them alive until the shepherd Faustulus discovered them.
Amulius ordered the infant Romulus and his twin Remus drowned in the Tiber to eliminate any rivals to his usurped throne. The twins survived and later returned to kill Amulius and restore their grandfather Numitor.
Remus and Romulus quarreled over the site of their new city and the interpretation of the augury. Remus claimed priority with six vultures seen first; Romulus claimed superiority with twelve seen later.
Titus Tatius, king of the Sabines, waged war against Romulus after the Romans seized Sabine women. The conflict ended when the Sabine women intervened on the battlefield, leading to a joint kingship.
Romulus slew Acron, king of Caenina, in single combat during the war provoked by the Rape of the Sabine Women. He dedicated Acron's armor as the first spolia opima to Jupiter Feretrius.
Romulus and Remus killed their great-uncle Amulius, the usurper who had deposed their grandfather Numitor and ordered the twins drowned as infants.
Romulus killed his twin brother Remus during a dispute over where to found their city. Remus leaped over the newly plowed sacred boundary in mockery, and Romulus struck him down.
⚠ Ovid's Fasti 4.843 names Celer, one of Romulus's followers, as the actual killer. Livy 1.7 and Plutarch's Life of Romulus 10 attribute the killing directly to Romulus.
Romulus ruled as the first king of Rome for nearly four decades, establishing its laws, institutions, Senate, and military organization before his apotheosis.
Romulus founded Rome on the Palatine Hill, plowing the sacred pomerium and building the first walls of the city after killing Remus.
The infant Remus and his twin Romulus were cast into the flooding Tiber River on Amulius's orders but survived when their basket came to rest at the foot of the Palatine Hill.
Romulus was born in Alba Longa as the son of Mars and Rhea Silvia, a princess of the ancient Latin city. After overthrowing the usurper Amulius, Romulus left Alba Longa to found Rome.
Romulus established an asylum on the Capitoline Hill to attract settlers to the new city of Rome, and dedicated the first spolia opima at the temple of Jupiter Feretrius on its summit.
Romulus staged the Rape of the Sabines during the Consualia, Consus's festival. He invited the Sabines to the horse races and seized their women at a prearranged signal.
Jupiter appeared to Romulus as Jupiter Feretrius, receiving the spolia opima — armor stripped from an enemy king slain in single combat — at Rome's first temple on the Capitoline.
The Lupercal, the sacred cave at the foot of the Palatine Hill, was where the she-wolf nursed the infant Romulus and his twin Remus after they were abandoned on the banks of the Tiber.
Mars, as divine father, watched over Romulus throughout his life. At Romulus's death, Mars carried his son to heaven in a chariot during a storm on the Campus Martius, completing his apotheosis as Quirinus.
Romulus founded Rome on the Palatine Hill on April 21, 753 BCE, plowing a sacred furrow to mark the city's boundary. The hill where the she-wolf had nursed the twins became Rome's birthplace.
After Romulus vanished in a storm on the Campus Martius, he appeared as a divine figure to Proculus Julius, commanding the Romans to worship him as Quirinus.
Romulus ordered the seizure of the Sabine Women during the Consualia festival to provide wives for Rome's settlers. The women later rushed onto the battlefield to end the war between their Roman husbands and Sabine fathers.
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