Ah, yes...the joy of having a sibling. The bickering, the fighting, the knowledge that (for the most part) you would stick by your brother or sister no matter what. I wouldn't know, as I'm an only child. But among my close friends are two sets of twins.
Why am I flapping my jaw about siblings? Because that's what the next myth is about, of course. What do you do when your twin brother won't listen to your ideas? If you're Romulus, the mythical founder of Rome, you kill him.
Seems a bit harsh, but apparently that's the way things were done in the ancient world. Punishments were extremely undesirable. Perhaps I should do a little bit sometime about the Code of Hammurabi, just to show you how gruesome your fate could be if you did wrong by someone else.
Romulus and Remus were, according to myth, twin sons of a woman (Rhea Silvia) who was raped by the war god Mars. The woman's great-uncle, who also happened to be an extremely jealous and seemingly paranoid king, sought to rid himself of the twins, who were next in line for the throne. However, he couldn't actually kill them because then he'd have their divine father to contend with. So he put them in a basket (sound familiar to any Christians out there?) and threw said basket into a river (likely the Tiber).
Fate was on their side, as the basket washed up on the banks somewhere downriver and a she-wolf heard the babies' cries. She nursed them and cared for them until a shepherd named Faustulus found them and took them in.
Let's fast-forward a few years. Growing to become natural leaders, the boys set out to build a new city for the followers they'd acquired to reside; however, they were at odds with each other concerning the location. Those of you who are not an only child would probably understand--siblings disagree. Especially twins. But these are the sons of a war god we're talking about. During the altercation, Romulus struck Remus down, killing him. He went on to build his city (we're assuming after a bit of mourning had taken place), which he named Rome.
Moral of the story: Don't fight with your sibling unless you're absolutely sure he's not in the mood to murder you.
My source so I could get the details and facts straight, as it has been years since I first read this myth (pretty much a decade):
http://www.godchecker.com/pantheon/roman-mythology.php?deity=ROMULUS
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