THE KING OUTWITTED

Tarquin claimed Ancus's sons were too young to rule and became the fifth king. Though he gained power wrongfully, he improved Rome. He built the Cloaca Maxima, a great sewer large enough for teams of oxen, still perfect 2400 years later. It drained the Forum, a marketplace surrounded by covered walks where Romans gathered. Tarquin built a huge circus and began a new fortress called the Capitol on the Capitoline Hill. He surrounded Rome with walls covering all seven hills: Palatine, Capitoline, Quirinal, Caelian, Aventine, Viminal, and Esquiline. Tarquin added twelve lictors carrying rods and axes. When augurs opposed him, he tested the chief augur Attus Navius by asking if he could cut a pebble with a razor. The augur said yes—and the razor cut the pebble like clay. After that, Tarquin never opposed the priests.