Foundation of the Roman Republic
- Date
- c. 509 BCE (traditional)
- Category
- Politics & governance
- Region
- Italy (Rome / Latium)
- Era
- Classical Antiquity
- Significance
According to Roman tradition, the citizens of Rome expelled their seventh and last king, Lucius Tarquinius Superbus ('the Proud'), and replaced the monarchy with a republic in which sovereign power (res publica, 'the public thing') was vested in the citizen body and exercised through annually elected magistrates.
In place of a lifelong king, the Romans installed two consuls who held supreme civil and military authority (imperium) but for only a single year, checking each other's power and answerable to the Senate and popular assemblies. The traditional narrative, recorded by Livy and others, frames the revolution around the rape of the noblewoman Lucretia and the leadership of Lucius Junius Brutus, but modern scholars regard much of this account as legendary and date the transition only approximately. Whatever its precise circumstances, the shift from monarchy to a system of shared, term-limited, collegial offices established the institutional framework that would govern Rome for nearly five centuries and shaped enduring Western ideas of republican government, separation of powers and elected magistracy.
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Empires active in c. 509 BCE (traditional)
- Achaemenid Empire550 BCE – 330 BCE
- Roman Kingdom753 BCE – 509 BCE
- Roman Republic509 BCE – 27 BCE
- Scythians800 BCE – 300 BCE
- Carthaginian Empire650 BCE – 146 BCE
- Zhou Dynasty1046 BCE – 256 BCE
Related politics & governance events
- Cleisthenes' reforms establish Athenian democracy508/507 BCE
- Cyrus the Great Founds the Achaemenid Persian Empire550 BCE
- Darius I Builds the Royal Road and Imperial Administrationc. 500 BCE
- Cyrus Conquers Babylon and the Cyrus Cylinder539 BCE
- Codification of the Law of the Twelve Tables451–449 BCE
- Death of Alexander and the Partition of Babylon323 BCE
Further reading
The wider story
The Rise of Rome: The Making of the World's Greatest Empire
Brisk popular narrative of Rome from its legendary kings.
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