Spurius Carvilius Ruga
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Spurius Carvilius Ruga (possibly 600 BCE or 230 BCE) was a semi-legendary freedman living in Rome who invented the letter G. His invention would have been quickly adopted in the Roman Republic because the letter C was, at the time, confusingly used both for the /k/ and /g/ sounds. Ruga was also the first man in recorded history to open a private elementary school, and allegedly the first to divorce his wife.
Plutarch is our only source for the first and second inventions. Dionysius of Halicarnassus and Aulus Gellius both attest to the story of the divorce. According to Dionysius' account,
- Spurius Carvilius, a man of distinction, was the first to divorce his wife ... yet because of his action, though it was based on necessity, he was ever afterwards hated by the people.
However, their date of 230 BCE for Ruga's divorce is somewhat absurd, because the Twelve Tables written in 450 BCE include a provision for divorce. There is no consensus as to how many of Ruga's alleged inventions should be attributed to him, but no other ancient text claims other inventors.
Spurius Carvilius Maximus.
A novus homo, he was consul in 293, and celebrated a triumph over the Samnites. He founded a temple of Fors Fortuna and dedicated a colossal statue of Jupiter Capitolinus made from captured Samnite armour. (Pliny N.H. 34.43; Livy 10.43; Fasti Capit.). According to Velleius Paterculus (2.128), he was censor, probably in 289. In 272 he had a second consulship, again campaigning against the Samnites (Front. Aq. 10.6).
Spurius Carvilius Maximus Ruga.
Perhaps son of the above, was consul in 234, celebrating a triumph for his victories in Corsica and Sardinia. He was consul again in 228, and augur in 211. A tradition cited by Valerius Maximus claimed that he was the first Roman to divorce his wife.
Spurius Carvilius, freedman of the above, was claimed to be one of the first masters of a Roman grammar school (Plutarch Quaest. Rom. 59), and is credited with introducing the letter C into the Latin alphabet.
[edit] Sources
- Quaestiones Romanae questions 54 and 59.
- Earliest Roman Divorces: Divergent Memories or Hidden Agendas? by Gary Martin
- Roman Inventors - Spurius Carvilius Ruga
