* Seven Fatal Things * seven giants * Marcus Aurelius * Lacus Curtius * Torre delle Milizie * Dioscuri * Tiber * Foundation * Appian way *

In the ancient times the Seven Fatal Things were taken to Rome: first thing was the Cybele’s needle, a black stone adored in Asia Minor and took to Rome to avoid the defeat against Cartage; then the quadriga dei Vejenti, given by the city of Vejo as a chariot during a race took the way to Rome and stopped on the Capitolium; Oreste’s ashes, son of Agamennon, considered a talisman; Priamo’s scepter, king of Troy, took by Aeneas and given to Dido; Ilione’s veil which belonged to eldest Priamo’s daughter; Athena Pallade’s statue called the Palladium, also took to Latium by Aenaes, and, finally, the twelve shields called Ancili, eleven of them copied from the first one, fell from the sky, by Numa to disarrange thieves.

The seven giants in Rome were colossal statues adorning the city: the ones of Apollo and Jove on the Capitolinus hill, two identical ones of Jove in the Campus Martius, Apollo’s statue in Augustus’library, the colossus symbolizing Nero by the Coliseum (from which it took its name), the one of Domitian in the Forum.

According to an old legend, when the equestrian statue of Marcus Aurelius (a copy is placed in the middle of Piazza del Campidoglio) will be again shining og gold, the "owl", which is camouflaged in the horse’s mane, will sing again announcing the universal judgment. The one of Marcus Aurelius is the only equestrian statue remaining from the ancient times and survived only because was believed to be the one of Constantine, the emperor who proclaimed the Christianity as the Empire official religion.

In the Forum, a big hole was opened (still visible and called Lacus Curtius) and the oracle interpreted as a disgrace leaning on the city and ready to fall if what most valuable to Rome wasn’t sacrificed. Marcus Curtius, considered then by the people as the hero of Rome, threw himself in the hole.

For a very long time it was believed that during the Rome’s fire, Nero admired the show from Torre delle Milizie, a tower in the Traian’s forum. Certainly it is not true as the tower was built only in the XIII century.

After the Lake Regillo battle in 496 b.C., where the last king of Rome, was expulsed from Rome, the Dioscuri appeared in the Forum to announce the victory and released their horses at Giugurta’s fountain. In honor of the two twin gods, the temple dedicated to them, Castor and Pollux, was erected just there.

Many rumors say that under the waters of the Tiber many treasures could be hidden, threw in the river during the centuries for different reasons: the most famous is the seven gold branches sconce took to Rome by Titus from Jerusalem, the Fidia’s Apollus, Baccus called "of the Tiber", and the headless Athena’s statue found by Ponte Rotto. Less value objects were found too such as Lanzichenecchi’s spears of 1527, French rifles of 1799 and Garibaldini’s guns of 1849.

The Aventinus is the hill where according to the Foundation’s legend, Remus was to count the greatest number of vultures. Remus counted 7 against the 12 of his brother Romulus, so that this was one who established the new city.

The struggle between three Romans brothers (the Orazi’s) and three from Alba Longa (the Curiazi’s) was organized to solve the long battle between the two cities; that place is remembered with two different tumulus on the Appian way; in that point passed the border between the two lands.