can be called
'Rome' was the community of the Palatine hill, which rises out of the
valleys more abruptly than any of the other hills and was the natural
place to be selected for fortification: the outline of the walls and
sacred enclosure running outside them (_pomoerium_) may still be
traced, marking the limits of 'square Rome' (_Roma quadrata_), as the
historians called it. The Palatine community no doubt pursued their
agricultural labours over the neighbouring valleys and hills, and
gradually began to extend their settlement till it included the
Esquiline and Caelian and other lesser heights which made up the
Septimontium--the next stage of Rome's development. Meanwhile a kindred
settlement had been established on the opposite hills of the Quirinal
and Viminal, and ultimately the two communities united, enclosing
within their boundaries the Capitol and their meeting-place in the
valley which separated them--the Forum. In this way was formed the Rome
of the Four Regions, which represents the utmost extent of its
development during the period which gave rise to the genuine Roman
religion. All these stages have left their mark on the customs of
religion. _Roma quadrata_ comes to the fore in the Lupercalia: not
merely is the site of the ceremony a grotto on the Palatine
(_Lupercal_), but when the _Luperci_ run their purificatory course
around the boundaries, it is the circuit of the Palatine hill which
marks its limits. Annually on the 11th of December the festival of the
Septimontium was celebrated, not by the whole people, but by the
_montani_, presumably the inhabitants of those parts of Rome which
were included in the second settlement. Finally, the addition of the
Quirinal settlement is marked by the inclusion among the great
state-gods of Quirinus, who must have been previously the local deity
of the Quirinal community.

But more important for us than the history of the early settlement is
its character. We have spoken of early Rome as an agricultural
community: it would be more exact and more helpful to describe it as a
community of agricultural households. The institutions of Rome, legal
as well as religious, all point to the household (_familia_) as the
original unit of organisation: the individual, as such, counted for
nothing, the community was but the aggregate of families. Domestic
worship then was not merely independent of the religion of the
community: it was prior to it, and is both its historical and l