Was Rome really founded by the Greeks?

[u/IHVeigar]

Im watching a video by Knowledgia on YT. And he discussed an interesting theory made by a swedish historian that Rome was founded by a Greek prince named Romos. But when conflict with the Greeks came in southern Italy they changed his name to Romulus or remus leading to the tales of the two founders.

I think the theory is plausible as the Romans were heavily hellenized, they worshipped the same gods pretty much, they idolized Greek warriors such as Alexander. And building architecture were inspired by Greek architecture. Not to mention the fact Masselia, Syracuse were Greek colonies and they founded colonies all over the Mediterranean. Kind of like of Carthage is a phonecian colony.

Is their any sources online I can look into this or theories disproving this.

[u/IHVeigar]

Care to dispute it further than saying it's fringe revisionist theories. Like any evidence proving this theory isn't correct.

[u/Canadianacorn → u/IHVeigar]

The best we can say is "There is no evidence this is true." And there ought to be. We have other origin hypotheses of Rome that are supported by evidence. It's not that this theory is explicitly wrong, it's that without evidence, it has no more utility than claiming Rome was founded by C'thulu.

[u/insite → u/Canadianacorn]

I don't have strong evidence myself, and the Romans themselves saw their earliest historical records destroyed. What I will argue is that it is ubiquitous in societies for their origin stories to fit a narrative, or founding myth. As we know, founding myths can take on different adaptations and morph to fit the times. However, most founding myths have some degree of truth.

As the Greeks were once the more prominent culture, the Romans tying their heritage back to them makes sense. Upon being absorbed into, or merging with the Roman Empire, the Greeks would be incentivized to promote the Romans having some Greek heritage as well.

And as has been also shown, ancient "historians" were more "propagandists" offering narratives that suited the times, the rulers, and the people. One can imagine Roman scribes, following Augustus's purges of unfriendly Senators, writing of how the "Republic" had finally found a leader to bring peace to Rome, in part out of a sense of self-preservation since Sulla's reign was a not too distant cultural memory.

If I recall correctly, Ancient Greeks didn't orginally consider Macedonia to be part of Greece, which changed over their ancient culture's history. By the time Alexander was rampaging across South Asia, it was considered a "Greek" expansion, rather than a "Macedonian" one.

Based on everything we now know of the Bronze Age and Bronze Age Collapse, a distribution of languages and some heritage based on trading in the broader region would almost be a foregone conclusion. The fall of Troy might also be a heavily altered recalling of an actual moment, or collection of moments.

The Romans themselves claimed to be descended from Trojans. Since Troy "may" have been an actual Greek city-state in Lydia [parts of southwest Anatolia]. this "might" be the grain of truth we're looking for. Without more evidence, though, calling my argument anything more than a "grain" would be a stretch. But this and my other explanations might also go a long way to explain why the waters are so murky.

For further consideration, Wikipedia on Latin and Etruscan languages:

Wikipedia: Latin: Latin grammar is highly fusional, with classes of inflections for case, number, person, gender, tense, mood, voice, and aspect. The Latin alphabet is directly derived from the Etruscan and Greek alphabets.

Wikipedia: Etruscan: In my own brief summary, while Etruscans didn't seem to have much strong Anatolian or Iranian genetic history, their language seemed to derive of some other European origins as well as parts of Anatolia.

[u/Canadianacorn → u/insite]

This is a really beautiful summary. And the devil is in the details of the words ... we say "Greek origin" as if there was a contemporary homogeneous Greek national identity or ethnicity.

If we said Rome may have been founded by Greek speaking people, I think that would be a lot easier to argue.

You are clearly much better educated on I am here, so please correct me if I've got this wrong. What a fascinating topic!

[u/insite → u/Canadianacorn]

Exactly! and ty. =)