The street where Tullia disgraced the dead king afterward became known as the Vicus Sceleratus, the Street of Crime. The king's blood spattered against the chariot and stained Tullia's clothes, so that she brought a gruesome relic of the murder back to her house. But in a frenzy, Tullia herself seized the reins, and drove the wheels of her chariot over her father's corpse. As she drove toward the Urbian Hill, her driver stopped suddenly, horrified at the sight of the king's body, lying in the street. But Tarquin bade her return home, concerned that the crowd might do her violence. Tullia drove in her chariot to the senate-house, where she was the first to hail her husband as king. The king's retainers fled, and as he made his way towards the palace, the aged Servius was set upon and murdered by Tarquin's assassins, perhaps on the advice of his own daughter. When word of this brazen deed reached Servius, he hurried to the curia to confront Tarquin, who leveled the same accusations against his father-in-law, and then in his youth and vigor carried the king outside and flung him down the steps of the senate-house and into the street. He then spoke to the senators, denigrating Servius as a slave born of a slave for failing to be elected by the senate and the people during an interregnum, as had been the tradition for the election of kings of Rome for having become king through the machinations of a woman for favouring the lower classes of Rome over the wealthy, and for taking the land of the upper classes for distribution to the poor and for instituting the census so that the wealth of the upper classes might be exposed in order to excite popular envy. He went to the senate house with a group of armed men, sat himself on the throne, and summoned the senators to attend upon him. In time, Tarquin felt ready to seize the throne. He bestowed presents upon them, and spread criticism of Servius the king. Tarquin solicited the support of the patrician senators, especially those from houses that had been raised to senatorial rank under Tarquin the Elder. Tullia encouraged her husband to advance his own position, ultimately persuading him to usurp her father, king Servius. They had three sons: Titus, Arruns, and Sextus, and a daughter, Tarquinia, who married Octavius Mamilius, the prince of Tusculum. After the murder of their spouses, Tarquin and Tullia were married. She came to despise him, and conspired with Tarquin to bring about the deaths of Tullia Major and Arruns. Her younger sister, Tullia Minor, was of fiercer temperament, but her husband Arruns was not. The elder sister, Tullia Major, was of mild disposition, yet married the ambitious Tarquin. One of Tarquin's sisters, Tarquinia, married Marcus Junius Brutus, and was the mother of Lucius Junius Brutus, one of the men who would later lead the overthrow of the Roman Kingdom. To forestall further dynastic strife, Servius married his daughters, known to history as Tullia Major and Tullia Minor, to Lucius Tarquinius Superbus, the future king, and his brother Arruns. This may recollect an otherwise forgotten attempt by the sons of Tarquin the Elder to reclaim the throne. Īccording to an Etruscan tradition, the hero Macstarna, usually equated with Servius Tullius, defeated and killed a Roman named Gnaeus Tarquinius, and rescued the brothers Caelius and Aulus Vibenna from captivity. When the sons of Marcius subsequently arranged the elder Tarquin's assassination in 579 BC, Tanaquil placed Servius Tullius on the throne, in preference to her own sons or grandsons. Tanaquil had engineered her husband's succession to the Roman kingdom on the death of Ancus Marcius. The most ancient sources, such as that of Quintus Fabius Pictor, assert Tarquin was the son of Tarquinius Priscus, but modern historians believe that to be "impossible" under the traditional chronology, indicating either he was Priscus' grandson or that the traditional chronology itself is "unsound". His reign has been described as a tyranny that justified the abolition of the monarchy. Tarquin was said to have been either the son or grandson of Lucius Tarquinius Priscus, the fifth king of Rome, and to have gained the throne through the murders of both his wife and his elder brother, followed by the assassination of his predecessor, Servius Tullius. Īncient accounts of the regal period mingle history and legend. He is commonly known as Tarquin the Proud, from his cognomen Superbus ( Latin for "proud, arrogant, lofty"). Lucius Tarquinius Superbus (died 495 BC) was the legendary seventh and final king of Rome, reigning 25 years until the popular uprising that led to the establishment of the Roman Republic. Lucius Tarquinius Priscus (possibly grandfather)
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