Toynbee "Alba"

The Emperor Justinian (in the Heaven of Mercury) mentions Alba Longa in connexion with the Roman Eagle, which he says remained there for 300 years (cf. {Livy. I. xxix. 6}) until the defeat of the three Alban Curiatii by the three Roman Horatii, [Par. vi. 37-39]. (Cf. {Livy. 1. xxiv-xxvii}, {Orosius. II. iv.}) [Aquila_1: Albani: Curiatii.] [See P. Toynbee, 'The Chronology of Paradiso vi. 1-6, 37-39', Athenaeum (Aug. 6, 1898), 193; reprinted in his SR, pp 298-299; he says: 'Justinian puts the period from the foundation of Alba Longa to the fight between the Horatii and Curiatii and the end of the Alban sovereignty at 300 years and more ("trecento anni ed oltre"). The traditional date of the fall of Troy, some thirty years after which Alba was founded ({Livy, i. 3}), iS B.C. 1184. This gives 431 years (Orosius says 414, {Orosius. Hist. ii. 4, 1}) to the foundation of Rome in 753, and consequently considerably more than 400 years to the destruction of Alba by Tullus Hostilius, the third king of Rome. If Dante were following this reckoning (as is commonly assumed by the commentators) his "300 years and more" would be a very loose way of putting it, and very unlike his usual preciseness. . . . I think there can be little doubt that he is following Brunetto [Latini], who, in his chapter on Romulus and Remus in the Trésor, puts the foundation of Rome at only 313 years after, the fall of Troy. Benvenuto da Imola, in his commentary, refers to a passage in the Aeneid ({Virg. Aen. i. 267-274}) in which Virgil computes the period between the foundation of Alba by Ascanius and the birth of Romulus and Remus at 300 years.' ({Virg. Aen. i. 272}: 'hic iam ter centum totos regnabitur annos.')]