wife, and half to the temple of Ceres. A man who divorced his wife was
to make an offering to the Chthonian gods.[A] A peculiarity of his
legislation is that, while he laid down no course of procedure in case
of parricide, he speaks of all murder by the name of parricide, as
though the one were an abominable, but the other an impossible crime.
And for many years it appeared that he had rightly judged, for no one
attempted anything of the kind at Rome for nearly six hundred years; but
it is said that the first parricide was that of Lucius Hostilius, which
he committed after the war with Hannibal. Enough has now been said upon
these subjects.

[Footnote A: Chthonian gods are the gods of the world below.]

XXIII. In the fifth year of the reign of Tatius, some of his relatives
fell in with ambassadors from Laurentum, on their way to Rome, and
endeavoured to rob them. As the ambassadors would not submit to this,
but defended themselves, they slew them. Romulus at once gave it as his
opinion that the authors of this great and audacious crime ought to be
punished, but Tatius hushed the matter up, and enabled them to escape.
This is said to have been the only occasion upon which they were openly
at variance, for in all other matters they acted with the greatest
possible unanimity. The relatives, however, of the murdered men, as they
were hindered by Tatius from receiving any satisfaction, fell upon him
when he and Romulus were offering sacrifice at Lavinium, and slew him,
but respected Romulus, and praised him as a just man. He brought home
the body of Tatius, and buried it honourably. It lies near what is
called the _Armilustrium_, on Mount Aventine.

But Romulus neglected altogether to exact any satisfaction for the
murder. Some writers say that the city of Lavinium, in its terror,