Every prominent historian knows about the Num of Pompilia. He was chanted by many great singers and writers. For example, the French writer Florian on Num Pompilia wrote a whole poem. But most modern people know at best his name. So this shortcoming will be useful to eliminate by briefly talking about it.
Who is he?
Each student will be able to name the first ruler of Rome without difficulty. Of course, this is Romulus - the founder of the Eternal City and one of the twins fed by the legendary she-wolf. But who became the second ruler of Rome? This question is already much more difficult to answer. In fact, the second ruler of Rome was Numa Pompilius. He carried out numerous reforms aimed both at improving the lives of ordinary people, and at increasing the power of the young state, which only after a few centuries will be destined to become great.
short biography
To begin with, it is worth telling a brief biography of Numa Pompilia. By an amazing coincidence, he was born on the same day that the city of Rome was founded, on April 21, 753 BC. His father is Pomponius, a native of the noble Sabine family. Numa became the fourth son in the family. Despite his wealth and serious position, Pomponius kept the whole family in strictness, practically under Spartan conditions.
For the first time, Numa married very young - his wife was the daughter of the Sabinian king Tzius, who ruled with Romulus. Alas, the young wife died shortly after the wedding. After this, Numa did not agree with the women for a long time, but subsequently married Lucretia. She bore him four sons - Pina, Pomp, Mamerka and Kalpa. It is believed that it was from these names that noble Roman surnames subsequently came from (though this fact is highly doubtful).
Numa also had a daughter - Pompilia. Subsequently, she became the wife of Marcius the First and gave birth to the powerful ruler Anka Marcius.
How he became a ruler
As already mentioned, Numa Pompilius came from a wealthy, influential family. However, he had no rights to the throne of Rome. However, he did not strive for power, conquests at all. He was much more interested in art, a peaceful path of development. But later he had to change his mind.
The fact is that after the death of Romulus there was no ruler left who would have the right to take his place. As a result, he was replaced by the Senate, consisting of one hundred people. The authority of the ruler was transferred to each patrician for exactly one day, after which he was replaced by the next. The lack of unity of command affected the country negatively - each interim ruler believed that it was he who would lead Rome and his people to prosperity, and the methods were very different. In addition, the Sabines in the Senate were much less than the Romans, which caused the dissatisfaction of the first, threatened to develop into a split and a civil war.
Therefore, after long discussions in the Senate, it was decided to choose a single ruler. Moreover, he had to come from the Sabine people in order to compensate for their small number in the government. The choice fell on Numa Pompilia, whose biography changed dramatically after this incident. On the one hand, he was an extremely educated, calm, reasonable, and pious man. On the other hand, Numa has never been a supporter of forceful resolution of issues. The Sabines hoped that it was he who would make the warlike Romans curb their ambitions and learn to find a peaceful solution to the issue.
For a long time, Numa Pompilius refused to rule, not wanting to occupy such an important post. Only after prolonged persuasion by the father and prefect of Rome, Marcius the First, did he change his mind by agreeing to become a ruler.
Reign Achievements
As subsequent events showed, he did not in vain change his mind. It was under the Num of Pompilia that Rome began to grow rich, rapidly gaining strength.
Not warlike, devoid of ambition, Numa turned out to be a good strategist, a wise ruler. Coming from a peasant region, he was used to solve all issues slowly, as thoroughly as possible. It definitely benefited the country.
To begin with, he counted all the lands belonging to Rome, carried out a land survey - not a single piece of land was left unaccounted for, was not deprived of the owner. Of course, such an economic approach rather quickly affected the state of the state economy.
The next step, he established workshops for artisans, dividing them by occupation. Each workshop now had its own meetings and rites. This turned out to be an even more reasonable reform, uniting the people.
Before this unity in Rome was not. The people were divided into calm, hardworking Sabines and warlike, ardent Romans. In addition, part of the people called themselves the citizens of Romulus, while others called themselves the people of Tzius. This could at any moment lead to a civil war and the death of a young state.
And so that this would not happen, Numa came up with a completely new way of dividing, not causing such a serious confrontation, mixing two close people. He divided all the masters and free people by profession into eight largest workshops, which included dyers, shoemakers, musicians, potters, coppersmiths and others. The remaining crafts, smaller and not able to form their own workshop, were combined into a common ninth.
For each workshop, King Numa Pompilius instituted the appropriate holidays, indicated the patron gods, whom should be honored accordingly. As a result, yesterday’s two enemies - the Sabine and the Roman - discovered that both of them are coppersmiths and can learn a lot from each other, and there is absolutely no reason for hostility.
At the same time, he seriously changed the existing pantheon of gods, which the locals worshiped. For example, he appointed the Term as one of the main ones - the god of borders and land surveying. Thus, the wise ruler managed to avoid unnecessary conflicts between the landowners - no one wanted to incur the wrath of powerful gods. Fidesz, the goddess of peace and honest labor, began to be venerated very highly. This is what Rome needed most for prosperity. Finally, he created the cult of the goddess Vesta - the patroness of the hearth. Few people know, but it was Numa Pompilius who founded the order of vestals - women serving the powerful goddess.
However, he also did not forget about the old gods. Moreover, the ruler established the post of priest. They were supposed to make sacrifices to Jupiter, Mars and other famous gods.
Nume was no stranger to a certain symbolism. For example, he chose the place for his second palace very carefully. As a result, the residence was built between two Roman hills - the Quirinale (where the Romans mainly lived) and the Palatine (the residence of the Sabinians). Thus, Numa pointed out that the king is equally close to both great nations, is completely impartial, despite the fact that he himself comes from the Sabines.
The humanity of the ruler
Humanity, not characteristic of most rulers of that cruel time, glorified Numa almost more than his other reforms. There are even legends about the Num of Pompilia. For example, that he was familiar with the nymph, the messenger of Jupiter, who taught him wisdom, gave valuable advice. We will talk about this a bit later.
But, no matter what the myths say, the ruler turned out to be really humane. For example, once he declared the human sacrifices that were made to Jupiter, objectionable to the father of the gods. As a result, people stopped killing on the altar. Instead, only part of them were brought in, specifically hair. Of course, many ordinary people breathed a sigh of relief - it is much easier to give their hair to the great Jupiter than to lay it on the altar itself, sprinkled with the blood of its predecessors.
Created Calendar
The calendar created by the ruler deserves special mention.
Before his arrival, the Roman calendar consisted of 10 months. The year began in March, and ended in December. The names of most months are familiar to us, but instead of July and August, there were others - quintilis and sextilis. Subsequently, they were renamed in honor of Guy Julius Caesar and Emperor Augustus.
However, Numa, having an idea of the life and life of the peasants, knew perfectly well that ten long months of 35-36 days were not very convenient. That is why he decided to reform and change the calendar. He shortened all existing months to 28-31 days, dividing the vacated days into two winter months, which he called January and February. The first was named in honor of the god Janus, and the second in honor of Phoebe.
Subsequently, the calendar was slightly modified and refined - this is how the Julian calendar appeared, adopted by Julius Caesar himself. It existed in our country until the beginning of the twentieth century, it was replaced by the Gregorian only after the revolution.
Death of the king
Despite numerous reforms, Numa Pompilius managed to avoid serious conflicts among his assistants and gain the respect of the common people. Therefore, unlike many reformers, he lived a long life. He died of old age at the age of 80. It happened in 673.
Long before his death, the ruler wrote an order on what should be done with his body. According to the tradition of his ancestors, he bequeathed to burn himself, and lay the ashes in a stone casket.
It is known that during his life, Pompilius was also a writer and also a philosopher. He wrote about a dozen books on religion and philosophy. Num bequeathed these books to be buried with himself, which was done by descendants who honored his will.
Subsequently, the burial place was found. In 181 BC, two stone caskets were found on Yanikul Hill during excavation work. In one, judging by the inscriptions made in Latin and Greek, the remains of the ruler were stored. And the second contained all the books he wrote. The casket turned out to be very airtight - for five hundred years the manuscripts did not decay. Alas, the local praetor ordered them to be burned, fearing that the thoughts expressed in the writings could harm the existing religious system at that time.
Legends of the Ruler
Myths about the Num of Pompilia are quite numerous. For example, one of them is connected precisely with the burial and his books. It is not known where such rumors came from, but much later, in the Middle Ages, information appeared among alchemists that the Roman ruler found the secret of a philosopher's stone that could turn ordinary metals into gold. There was even a version that the manuscripts were burned precisely in order to hide this secret, which the king of Rome wanted to take with him to the grave.
But much more interesting is the legend of Num Pompilia and the nymph Egeria.
The story of their acquaintance has two options. In one of them they met at a time when a young man mourned the death of his first wife. Suffering from heartache, he went to the Albanian mountains so that no one would see his suffering. There he met a nymph.
According to another version, this happened much later, when Numa ruled Rome for the seventh year.
A terrible epidemic broke out in the city (possibly a plague), and people died as whole families. The king did not know what to do - local doctors could not do anything, and the prayers of the priests did not help.
Retiring to the forest to ponder things, Numa suddenly saw a shield falling at his feet. He was brought to him by the nymph Egerius, and Jupiter personally handed over the shield. The only way to save the city was to use this shield. Nymph advised to make eleven replicas and hang on the walls in the temple, built in honor of the goddess Vesta. Every year in March (the month dedicated to the war god Mars) it was necessary to remove these shields and arrange a holy military rite with them. Compliance with the ritual promised to protect Rome from disease.
Of course, this is just a beautiful legend, but after that in the city for many years there was a fraternity of priests of Saliy, who performed the ritual every year.
There is also a legend that subsequently Numa visited Egeria at night, coming to her sacred grove. She opened to him the will of people and gods, prompted which laws should be adopted, and which reforms should be implemented. According to legend, it was a nymph who told the ruler that Jupiter would be content with the hair of people instead of human victims.
Mention in literature and cinema
Of course, such an important ruler, who has done so much for his city and people, is not forgotten without a trace. Many writers and poets dedicated poems to him, talked about his great deeds:
- An example of this is the poetic novel of the French writer Florian "Numa Pompilius", which tells about the life and accomplishments of the Roman king.
- Titus Livy gave him an important place in the book "History of Rome from the founding of the city."
- The writer Schwegler in his Roman History, published in German in 1867, spoke in detail about this ruler.
But with cinema, Numé Pompilius was less fortunate. He appears in only one film - Romulus and Remus. The film was released back in 1961, and Italian Sergio Corbucci became its director. The role of the ruler went to Enzo Ceruzico. Perhaps it was such a small popularity in the cinema that led to the fact that very few of our contemporaries know about this worthy ruler.
Conclusion
This can end the article. Now you know who Numa Pompilius was, how he became a ruler, and therefore became famous. Agree that such lessons of history should not be forgotten!