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This ceremony at the Pantheon was concluded by all visitors writing their names on two albums which had been placed near Victor Emmanuel's tomb and Raphael's tomb. The commemoration in the hall of the Horatii and Curiatii in the Capitol was a great success, their Majesties, the Ministers, the members of the diplomatic body, and a distinguished assembly being present.
Excellent! Would that this had been the only occasion in which the authority of Aristotle has been applied to subjects which do not belong to his jurisdiction! The Horatii has been censured for want of unity; the murder of the sister and the acquittal of the victorious Roman is said to be a second action, independent of the combat of the Horatii and Curiatii.
That they were called Horatii and Curiatii is certain enough, and there is hardly any fact of antiquity more generally known; yet in a manner so well ascertained, a doubt remains concerning their names, as to which nation the Horatii, to which the Curiatii belonged. Authors incline to both sides, yet I find a majority who call the Horatii Romans: my own inclination leads me to follow them.
"We passed the tombs of the Horatii and Curiatii, which looked much grander in the light of the torches than in the day, and, driving hastily through Albano, came upon the Campagna once more. It was still more like a desert in the night than in the day, for it was an interminable ocean, and the masses of ruins, coming darker than the rest, seemed like deserted wrecks upon its bosom.
The valour of Horatius in vanquishing the Curiatii deserved the highest reward. But in slaying his sister he had been guilty of a heinous crime. And so displeasing to the Romans was an outrage of this nature, that although his services were so great and so recent, they brought him to trial for his life.
The sacredness of the walls was thus illustrated in the tale of the death of Remus, the abolition of blood-revenge in the tale of the end of king Tatius , the necessity of the arrangement as to the -pons sublicius- in the legend of Horatius Cocles, the origin of the -provocatio- in the beautiful tale of the Horatii and Curiatii, the origin of manumission and of the burgess-rights of freedmen in the tale of the Tarquinian conspiracy and the slave Vindicius.
But during the reigns of the pagan emperors it was not safe in Rome to insinuate publicly any disbelief in such honoured legends as those of the wolf that suckled the foundlings; the ascent of Romulus into heaven; the nymph Egeria; the duel of the Horatii and Curiatii; the leaping of Curtius into the gulf on his horse; the cutting of a flint with a razor by Tarquin; the Sibyl and her books.
In the time of the empire there were still recognized Alban clans which were introduced among the burgesses of Rome after the fall of their native seat; amongst these were the Julii, Servilii, Quinctilii, Cloelii, Geganii, Curiatii, Metilii: the memory of their descent was preserved by their Alban family shrines, among which the sanctuary of the -gens- of the Julii at Bovillae again rose under the empire into great repute.
A wreath was set on the victor's head, and, loaded with the spoil of the Curiatii, he was led into the city in triumph. His sister came hurrying to meet him; she was betrothed to one of the Curiatii, and was in agony to know his fate; and when she saw the garment she had spun for him hanging blood-stained over her brother's shoulders, she burst into loud lamentations.
So it had come about that a contest between the two boat-crews was looked forward to with an interest almost equal to that with which the combat between the Horatii and Curiatii was regarded. The terms had been at last arranged between the two crews, after cautious protocols and many diplomatic discussions.
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