ABSTRACT

INTRODUCTION In this chapter I wish to apply the sorts of questions which we ask of the Greek polis to the communities of Central Italy. This is not a new idea, but the task of understanding Rome, for instance, through a comparative context is still incomplete.1 I will concentrate here on an appraisal of some similarities between the programmes of Clesithenes of Athens and Servius Tullius of Rome, after first outlining the context of the rise of the city-state in archaic Central Italy.