On the death of Latinus, AEneas reigned three years, the same kings continuing in the above-named places, except that Pelasgus was now king in Sicyon, and Samson was judge of the Hebrews, who is thought to be Hercules, because of his wonderful strength.Now the Latins made AEneas one of their gods, because at his death he was nowhere to be found.The Sabines also placed among the gods their first king, Sancus, [Sangus], or Sanctus, as some call him.At that time Codrus king of Athens exposed himself incognito to be slain by the Peloponnesian foes of that city, and so was slain.In this way, they say, he delivered his country.For the Peloponnesians had received a response from the oracle, that they should overcome the Athenians only on condition that they did not slay their king.Therefore he deceived them by appearing in a poor man's dress, and provoking them, by quarrelling, to murder him.Whence Virgil says, "Or the quarrels of Codrus."(1) And the Athenians worshipped this man as a god with sacrificial honors.The fourth king of the Latins was Silvius the son of AEneas, not by Creusa, of whom Ascanius the third king was born, but by Lavinia the daughter of Latinus, and he is said to have been his posthumous child.Oneus was the twenty-ninth king of Assyria, Melanthus the sixteenth of the Athenians, and Eli the priest was judge of the Hebrews; and the kingdom of Sicyon then came to an end, after lasting, it is said, for nine hundred and fifty-nine years.
CHAP.20.--OF THE SUCCESSION OF THE LINE OF KINGS AMONG THE ISRAELITESAFTER THE
TIMES OF THE JUDGES.
While these kings reigned in the places mentioned, the period of the judges being ended, the kingdom of Israel next began with king Saul, when Samuel the prophet lived.At that date those Latin kings began who were surnamed Silvii, having that surname, in addition to their proper name, from their predecessor, that son of AEneas who was called Silvius; just as, long afterward, the successors of Caesar Augustus were surnamed Caesars.Saul being rejected, so that none of his issue should reign, on his death David succeeded him in the kingdom, after he had reigned forty years.Then the Athenians ceased to have kings after the death of Codrus, and began to have a magistracy to rule the republic.
After David, who also reigned forty years, his son Solomon was king of Israel, who built that most noble temple of God at Jerusalem.In his time Alba was built among the Latins, from which thereafter the kings began to be styled kings not of the Latins, but of the Albans, although in the same Latium.
Solomon was succeeded by his son Rehoboam, under whom that people was divided into two kingdoms, and its separate parts began to have separate kings.
CHAP.21.--OF THE KINGS OF LATIUM, THE FIRST AND TWELFTH OF WHOM, AENEASAND
AVENTINUS, WERE MADE GODS.
After AEneas, whom they deified, Latium had eleven kings, none of whom was deified.But Aventinus, who was the twelfth after AEneas, having been laid low in war, and buried in that hill still called by his name, was added to the number of such gods as they made for themselves.Some, indeed, were unwilling to write that he was slain in battle, but said he was nowhere to be found, and that it was not from his name, but from the alighting of birds, that hill was called Aventinus.(2) After this no god was made in Latium except Romulus the founder of Rome.But two kings are found between these two, the first of whom I shall describe in the Virgilian verse:
"Next came that Procas, glory of the Trojan race."(3)That greatest of all kingdoms, the Assyrian, had its long duration brought to a close in his time, the time of Rome's birth drawing nigh.For the Assyrian empire was transferred to the Medes after nearly thirteen hundred and five years, if we include the reign of Belus, who begot Ninus, and, content with a small kingdom,was the first king there.Now Procas reigned before Amulius.
And Amulius had made his brother Numitor's daughter, Rhea by name, who was also called Ilia, a vestal virgin, who conceived twin sons by Mars, as they will have it, in that way honoring or excusing her adultery, adding as a proof that a she-wolf nursed the infants when exposed.For they think this kind of beast belongs to Mars so that the she-wolf is believed to have given her teats to the infants, because she knew they were the sons of Mars her lord; although there are not wanting persons who say that when the crying babes lay exposed, they were first of all picked up by I know not what harlot, and sucked her breasts first (now harlots were called lupae, she-wolves, from which their vile abodes are even yet called lupanaria), and that afterwards they came into the hands of the shepherd Faustulus, and were nursed by Acca his wife.Yet what wonder is it, if, to rebuke the king who had cruelly ordered them to be thrown into the water, God was pleased, after divinely delivering them from the water, to succor, by means of a wild beast giving milk, these infants by whom so great a city was to be rounded? Amulius was succeeded in the Latian kingdom by his brother Numitor, the grandfather of Romulus; and Rome was rounded in the first year of this Numitor, who from that time reigned along with his grandson Romulus.
CHAP.22.--THAT ROME WAS FOUNDED WHEN THE ASSYRIAN KINGDOM PERISHED, AT WHICHTIME HEZEKIAH REIGNED IN JUDAH.
