Editing Lucretia (section)

==Revolution==
[[File:Lucas Cranach (I) - Lucretia (Museo Soumaya).jpg|thumbnail|right|''Lucretia'' by [[Lucas Cranach the Elder]] ]]
{{Main|Overthrow of the Roman monarchy}}
The newly sworn revolutionary committee paraded the bloody corpse of Lucretia to the [[Roman Forum]] where it remained on display as a reminder of the dishonor committed. At the forum, the committee heard grievances against the Tarquins and began to enlist an army to abolish the monarchy. Brutus "urged them to act as men and Romans and take up arms against their insolent foes"<ref name=TLI59/> in response to the death of a dutiful wife. The gates of Rome were blockaded by the new revolutionary soldiers and more were sent to guard Collatia. By now a crowd had gathered in the forum; the presence of the magistrates among the revolutionaries kept them in good order.

Brutus was the Tribune of the Celeres, a minor office of some religious duties, which as a [[Magistrates' court|magistracy]] gave him the theoretical power to summon the [[curiae]], an organization of patrician families used mainly to ratify the decrees of the king. Summoning them on the spot, he transformed the crowd into an authoritative legislative assembly and began to address them in one of the more noted and effective speeches of ancient Rome.

He began by revealing that his pose as a fool was a sham designed to protect him against an evil king. He levelled a number of charges against the king and his family: Tarquin’s rape of Lucretia, whom everyone could see on the dais, the king's tyranny, the forced labor of the [[plebeians]] in the ditches and sewers of Rome. In his speech, he pointed out that Superbus had come to rule by the murder of [[Servius Tullius]], his wife's father, next-to-the-last king of Rome. He "solemnly invoked the gods as the avengers of murdered parents." He suggested that the king's wife, [[Tullia (daughter of Servius Tullius)|Tullia]], was in fact in Rome and probably was a witness to the proceedings from her palace near the forum. Seeing herself the target of so much animosity, she fled from the palace in fear of her life and proceeded to the camp at Ardea.<ref name=TLI59/>

Brutus opened a debate on the form of government Rome ought to have, a debate at which many [[Patrician (ancient Rome)|patricians]] spoke. In summation, he proposed the banishment of the Tarquins from all the territories of Rome and the appointment of an [[interrex]] to nominate new magistrates and conduct an election of ratification. They decided on a republican form of government with two consuls in place of a king executing the will of a patrician senate. This was a temporary measure until they could consider the details more carefully. Brutus renounced all right to the throne. In subsequent years, the powers of the king were divided among various elected magistracies.[[File:Gentileschi-Lucrezia-Potsdam.jpg|thumb|The rape, by [[Artemisia Gentileschi]]|left]]A final vote of the curiae carried the interim constitution. Spurius Lucretius was swiftly elected interrex; he was prefect of the city already. He proposed Brutus and Collatinus as the first two consuls and that choice was ratified by the curiae. Needing to acquire the assent of the population as a whole, they paraded Lucretia through the streets, summoning the plebeians to a legal assembly in the forum. Once there, they heard a constitutional speech by Brutus. It began:<ref>D.H. IV.78.</ref>

{{blockquote|In as much as Tarquinius neither obtained the sovereignty in accordance with our ancestral customs and laws, nor, since he obtained it—in whatever manner he got it—has he been exercising it in an honourable or kingly manner, but has surpassed in insolence and lawlessness all the tyrants the world ever saw, we patricians met together and resolved to deprive him of his power, a thing we ought to have done long ago, but are doing now when a favourable opportunity has offered. And we have called you together, plebeians, in order to declare our own decision and then ask for your assistance in achieving liberty for our country ....}}

A general election was held and the vote won in favor of the republic. This ended the monarchy, and during these proceedings Lucretia was still displayed in the forum.

The constitutional consequences of this event ended the reign of the hereditary king; however, [[Roman Empire|later emperors]] were absolute rulers in all but name. This constitutional tradition prevented both [[Julius Caesar]] and [[Octavian Augustus]] from accepting a crown; instead, they had to devise a confluence of several [[Roman Republic|republican offices]] onto their persons in order to secure absolute power. Their [[Roman emperor|successors]] both in [[Western Roman Empire|Rome]] and in [[Byzantine Emperor|Constantinople]] adhered to this tradition in essence, and the office of German [[Holy Roman Emperor]] remained elective rather than hereditary—up to its abolition in the [[Napoleonic Wars]], over 2300 years later.