In the beginning kings ruled at Rome, and in the end, as was fated, it came round to monarchy again. […] He boasted before the people that his house was descended from the immortal gods and from the kings of Rome. 2 Patrician and plebeian understood each other. […] In the West, in Africa and throughout Asia, towns, provinces and kings were bound to the imperator of the Roman People by personal ties of allegiance. […] More important than the kings were their rivals and heirs in power, the patricians, themselves for the most part of alien origin. […] Nor would a seat in the lower ranks of the Senate at Rome have been an extreme honour and unmixed blessing to the descendant of Etruscan kings or even to an Italian magnate.