Excerpt from The History Lover’s Guide to Ancient Rome by Callum Moy
First arrivals
Around two million years ago, the Homo genus started the long process of expansion out of Africa, fanning north and east, settling first in Asia then Europe and evolving into Homo Sapiens (modern humans) some 300,000 years ago.
It is believed the earliest humans arrived in the Italian Peninsula around 40,000 years ago, evidenced by cave paintings. And the first inhabitants of Rome had settled in the hills around the River Tiber by at least the Bronze Age.
Rome lay in a fertile plain of Latium and the city evolved from its natural site; a fortified collection of huts spread among seven hills, a river and a convenient crossing point that still exists called Tiber Island. These seven hills are known today as the Palatine, Capitoline, Quirinal, Viminal, Esquiline, Caelian and Aventine.
Rome’s favoured position meant it was often under attack from surrounding Italic peoples dwelling in the Apennine Hills (south-east of Rome) – mainly the Sabine and Samnite tribes. To the north was the territory of the more established Etruscans (Tuscany today), while the south was populated by colonies of Greeks including Naples in Campania and Syracuse in Sicily – so called ‘Greater Greece’.
Latium became a natural junction between the Etruscans and the Greeks in southern Italy, promoting interaction, trade and social integration – factors that had a major influence on the development of Rome itself.
Some historians argue that Rome owes its development to the Etruscans since its buildings, its people’s love of sporting games and even its first kings were of Etruscan origin (plus the Etruscans arrival in Italy predates that of the Greeks). Etruscans are thought to have been a sensual, but decadent, people but we will never be certain since no written records remain and their language is lost.
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