Iulus - Disconnect

Started by Justin Durand on Monday, May 29, 2017
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5/29/2017 at 7:00 PM

I recommend disconnecting Iulus from his parents.

Iulus is the legendary ancestor of the family of Julius Caesar (the Gens Iulia). According to the story Iulius was descended from the kings of Troy. The story appears in three different versions:

1. According to Vergil, Iulus was the same person as Ascanius, King of Alba Longa.
2. According to Livy, Iulus was the half-brother of Ascanius, the son of Aeneas by his Trojan wife, Creüsa.
3. According to Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Iulus was the son of Ascanius.

We don't know which version the family themselves believed but we do know Julius Caesar boasted about his descent from the goddess Venus. The Julio-Claudian dynasty honored her as Venus Genetrix ("Mother Venus") based on the legend the goddess fell in love with the mortal Anchises, and was mother by him of Aeneas.

There was a fashion in late Republican Rome for patrician families to claim descent from one of the gods, so the story is not unusual. Most modern scholars believe this is when the family of Julius Caesar invented the story that their ancestor Iulius 1000 years earlier was somehow connected to Aeneas' son Ascanius.

See, for example, T. P. Wiseman, "Legendary Genealogies in Late-Republican Rome" in Greece & Rome, Vol. 21, No. 2 (Oct., 1974), pp. 153-164 (Cambridge Univ. Press).

There are also chronological problems with the supposed relationship between Iulus and Ascanius. On Geni these are currently reflected by a 500 year gap between Iulus and his parents.

Finally, there is the problem on Geni that the line through Iulus is the most common path for users to be descended from the ancient Greek gods. Cutting this connection will re-route those connections through an equally fake British line. We'll have to deal with that one separately.

5/29/2017 at 8:56 PM

Well, I am not looking forward to whacking all the gods from the British Isles off the tree, but if indeed we are to disconnect the fictitious lines we need to be consistent. As much as possible.

And it's clear this profile needs to be cut.

I would ask for explanation of the lost parent in the curators notes and About section, and s link back to Iulus, in the profile left parentless.

But yes. Cut, is my thought.

Private User
5/30/2017 at 7:58 AM

3rd

5/30/2017 at 11:48 AM

I've been reminded privately that Cato says Ascanius was childless, which is why his heir was his brother Silvius.

All this has more to do with Roman politics of Julius Caesar's time than with the Fall of Troy 1200 years earlier.

5/30/2017 at 11:50 AM

Linking to this discussion:
Ascanius, king of Alba Longa

5/30/2017 at 2:36 PM

I agree with Anne: remove the connection but keep this information and a link to Iulius in the About section, etc.

Thanks Justin.

Private User
5/30/2017 at 2:43 PM

Somewhere or other I read a theory that the "gens Julius" actually referenced an ancestress Julia. Have no idea if there's anything to this,,but it's something to ponder.

5/30/2017 at 3:08 PM

I'm not sure about that. I wonder if it might be a misunderstanding. Roman names can be tricky for us moderns who do it differently. The name of the gens ("tribe" or "clan" or "family") is always feminine. So -- gens Julia (or Iulia). In the plural they are the Julii. All men have the name Julius and all women have the name Julia.

Until very late, women had only one name, the gens name (Julia), but they could be distinguished from one another as Julia Major (the Elder) or Julia Minor (the Younger).

By the late Republican period men had three names, a praenomen (Gaius), the gens name or nomen (Julius) and a cognomen (Caesar).

The Julii follow a common pattern in that they take their gens name from a distant, semi-mythical ancestor, is case Julius from Julus (or Iulus). We don't know much if anything about these ancient ancestors but they were perhaps local gods, or at least became deified after their death. Their worship was part of the household cult..

I wonder if the idea of a female ancestor Julia might come from a simple confusion about how Roman names worked? Or maybe there is a theory out there somewhere that the ancient Romans were originally matriarchal so that their divine ancestor Iulus was really a goddess Iula? Don't know. It would be interesting to read more.

5/30/2017 at 9:31 PM

Disconnected.

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