alt Hacker News> Respectfully, this is a stronger claim than I think anyone can make.
The only reason to treat this with kid gloves is because a large portion of the population believes in it.
Nobody has a problem saying that "Romulus and Remus is an entirely fictional account it's not based on any real historical events."
The stronger claim is a valid one to make because the primary source doesn't have any corroboration.
Replies
Amezarak • today at 6:44 PM
Denying the possible, even likely, historicity of Romulus and Remus is silly, yes.
➕ show 2 replies
I'd encourage you to re-read my comment and consider that you may have jumped to conclusions about what I'm trying to say.
> Nobody has a problem saying that "Romulus and Remus is an entirely fictional account it's not based on any real historical events."
I wouldn't go so far as to say this. We have artifacts and historical texts talking about them, so we at least know that Romulus and Remus are figures that ancient humans talked about.
If we had a time machine, could we go back in time and meet them? If there were two guys named that who generally did the things the Romans thought, were they actually raised by wolves? No idea with the former. The latter sounds unusual.
My point is that there are more interesting questions to ask than these. The book I recommended does a good job of this. It's a good read if you're interested in the cultural backdrop of the ancient near east.