PORSENNA, also PORSENA, LARS or LARTII (Lar,. in Etruscan, means "lord" or "prince"), in the early and uacertain history of Rome, appears as a powerful king of Clusium in Etruria. •ccordin_g to the legend told by Livy for history, when Tarquin the proud was expelled from Rome, he sought the help, first of the Veii and the Tar quinit (his Etruscan kinsmen), against his revolted subjects; but their efforts not proving successful, he turned to Porsenna, who willingly espoused his cause, and marched a great army against Rome. The Etruscan king seized the Janiculum, a fortified hill on the w. side of Tiber; and would have forced his way into the city across the "Bridge of Wooden Piles" (po:zs subeicins), had not a brave Roman, Horatius Codes, kept the of Porseuna's army at bay, while his comrades behiud him hewed down the bridge; after :which he plunged into the Tiber, and safely swam across its waves. Porsehna, we are informed, now laid siege to Rome; and after a while, the inhabitants began to suffer so severely from famine, that a desperate expedient was had recourse to. Three hun dred of the noblest Roman youths swore to peril their lives in cutting off the Etruscan king, The first on whom the lot fell was C. Mucius, who stole into the camp of Por senua, but not knowing the person of the king, killed his secretary instead, lie was instantly seized, and put to the torture; but the unshrinking audacity with which he thrust his right hand into the fire and let it burn, moved the king so much, that he pardoned him; whereupon Mucius (ever afterward called &srola, " the left-handed ") told him of the jeopardy in which he was placed. Porsenna resolved to make peace with Rome at once, and his conditions, which were pretty favorable, being accepted by the sorely-pressed citizens, he withdrew his forces. This version of the story is wholly discredited by modern criticism, and is believed to have been invented by the patriotic annalists of ancient Rome to conceal the fact of a temporary Etruscan conquest., and the evidence iu favor of this view is overwhelming. Tacitus even expressly affirms that
Porsenna conquered the city; Dionysius informs us that the senate sent him all ivory scepter, a golden crown, and a triumphal robe, which was the form that had been adopted by the Etruscan cities themselves of acknowledging the supremacy of the Roman king, 'larquinius Priscus; and Pliny mentions a circumstance which is quite conclusit-e as a proof of the subjugation of Rome—viz., that Porsenna forbade the citizens to use iron, except for agricultural purposes. Niebuhr, who has placed this view beyond all doubt, notices various minor incidents which are perfectly unintelligible, except on the hypoth esis of an Etruscan conquest. The whole details of the ancient legend, therefore, may be regarded as fabulous—the product of patriotic unveracity—and what seems most season able to believe, is, that a great rising of the Etruscan against the Latin races took place, and that Rome, forming the Latin frontier toward Etruria, was exposed to the first brunt of the war, and suffered is disastrous defeat; but that shortly after, the Etruscans themselves were decisively beaten, and forced back into their own territories; for after the conquest of Rome, Aruns, a son of Porsenna, proceeded against Aricia, where (according to Livy). his army was routed under the walls of that city by the combined forces of the Latin cities, with the help of Greek auxiliaries from Cumic. It is worth while quoting, as a. proof of Niebuhr's wonderful talent for felicitous conjecture, that he explains the long surviving Roman custom of beginning an auction by offering for sale the goods of king Porsenna, by the supposition that in the recovery of their independence, the Romans prob ably captured property belonging to their late master, which they may have publicly sold. The sepulcher of Porsenna at Clusium is described by Varro, but his descripticin is not credible. The ancient legend has been magnificently rendered in modern verse by Macaulay. See the Lays of Ancient Rome.