Remus

Roman demigod, son of Mars and Rhea Silvia; twin of Romulus; killed by Romulus during the foundation. The fratricide-at-foundation episode is structurally central to Roman political imagination — Wiseman (1995) reads it as a 4th-c. BCE elaboration responding to plebeian-patrician class conflict. Distinct from the Heracles-and-Iphicles twinship in the registry: Romulus and Remus are both ½ demigods (same divine father, same mortal mother) where Iphicles is purely mortal — the Roman tradition makes both twins demigods because Mars's paternity covers both via the same divine encounter.

Parentage

• paternal: Mars
• maternal: Rhea Silvia

Domains

• foundling twin

Powers

• Reads the flight of birds (saw six vultures)

Relations

• sibling: RomulusKilled by Romulus over the foundation-wall transgression (Livy) or as outcome of the augural-contest dispute over which twin would name the city (Plutarch).Liv. 1.7.2-3; Plut. Rom. 10 (primary)

Sources

• existence: Enn. Ann. fr. 77-91; Liv. 1.4-7; Dion. Hal. 1.79-87; Plut. Rom. 3-10; Ov. Fast. 4.807-862; Verg. Aen. 1.292-293 (primary)
• parentage: Liv. 1.4.2 (primary)
• death: Liv. 1.7.2-3; Plut. Rom. 10 (primary)