Founding of Rome - The Name of Rome

The Name of Rome

The name of the city is generally considered to refer to Romulus, but there are other hypotheses. Jean-Jacques Rousseau suggested Greek "ῥώμη" ("rhōmē"), meaning "strength, vigor". Another hypothesis refers the name to Roma, who supposedly was the daughter of Aeneas or Evander. The Basque scholar Manuel de Larramendi thought that the origin was the Basque word "orma" (modern Basque "horma"), meaning "wall".

Rome is also called the "Urbs", the word that in later Latin generically referred to any town or city. "Urbs" may ultimately have come from "urvus", the furrow cut by a plough, in this case, by that of Romulus.

The name "Romulus" is probably a back-formation; that is, the name "Romulus" was derived from the word "Rome". The suffix "-ulus" is masculine and a diminutive, so "Romulus" means "the little boy from Rome."