While the Greeks were thus forging rapidly ahead, their ancient kindred, the Latins, were also progressing, though at a rate less dazzling.  The true date of Rome’s founding we do not know.  Her own legends give B.C. 753.[17] But recent excavations on the Palatine hill show that it was already fortified at a much earlier period.  Rome, we believe, was originally a frontier fortress erected by the Latins to protect them from the attacks of the non-Aryan races among whom they had intruded.  This stronghold became ever more numerously peopled, until it grew into an individual state separate from the other Latin cities.

[Footnote 17:  See The Foundation of Rome, page 116.]

The Romans passed through the vicissitudes which we have already noted in Greece as characteristic of the Aryan development.  The early war leader became an absolute king, his power tended to become hereditary, but its abuse roused the more powerful citizens to rebellion, and the kingdom vanished in an oligarchy.[18] This last change occurred in Rome about B.C. 510, and it was attended by such disasters that the city sank back into a condition that was almost barbarous when compared with her opulence under the Tarquin kings.

[Footnote 18:  See Rome Established as a Republic, page 300.]

It was soon after this that the Persians, ignorant of their own decadence, and dreaming still of world power, resolved to conquer the remaining little states lying scarce known along the boundaries of their empire.  They attacked the Greeks, and at Marathon (B.C. 490) and Salamis (B.C. 480) were hurled back and their power broken.[19]

[Footnote 19:  See Battle of Marathon, page 322, and Invasion of Greece, page 354.]

This was a world event, one of the great turning points, a decision that could not have been otherwise if man was really to progress.  The degenerate, enfeebled, half-Semitized Aryans of Asia were not permitted to crush the higher type which was developing in Europe.  The more vigorous bodies and far abler brains of the Greeks enabled them to triumph over all the hordes of their opponents.  The few conquered the many; and the following era became one of European progress, not of Asiatic stagnation.

(FOR THE NEXT SECTION OF THIS GENERAL SURVEY SEE VOLUME II.)

DAWN OF CIVILIZATION

B.C. 5867[20]

G.C.C.  MASPERO

It is a far cry to hark back to 11,000 years before Christ, yet borings in the valley of the Nile, whence comes the first recorded history of the human race, have unveiled to the light pottery and other relics of civilization that, at the rate of deposits of the Nile, must have taken at least that number of years to cover.

     [Footnote 20:  Champollion.]