Note 11 — Chapter I · THE POPULUS AND ITS EARLIEST POLITICAL DIVISIONS

The original seat of the hero at Rome was on the Capitoline near the site of the later temple of Juno Moneta; Plut. Rom. 20. It was closely connected, therefore, with the auguraculum on the spot; Varro, L. L. v. 47; Cic. Off. iii. 16. 66; Fest. ep. 16. Perhaps his name has some etymological relation with titiare, “to chirp as a sparrow”; Varro, L. L. v. 85 (titiis avibus); Pais, Storia di Roma, I. i. 277 and n. 3; Forcellini, Lex. s. v. The Sodales Titii, who attended to his worship (cf. Dion. Hal. ii. 52. 5; Tac. Ann. i. 54; Hist. ii. 95) were accustomed to take a certain kind of auspices from birds; Varro, ibid. His tomb was in a place called Lauretum on the Aventine (Pais, ibid. 279), confused probably with Laurentum, where he is said to have been killed. All these circumstances indicate that Titus Tatius was an indigenous Roman, or at most a Latin hero, and that his connection with the Sabines is an ill-founded, relatively late idea. The primary origin of the word Titienses is Etruscan; Schulze, Lat. Eigennam. 218.