On This Day - April 21st
Featured Event:
Romulus and Remus found Rome (753 BC) 🇮🇹
Rome was founded in 753 BC, according to legend, by Romulus after he killed his twin brother Remus. The story blends myth and early history, with roots in Latin, Sabine, and Etruscan cultures.
Other Events:
1789: John Adams was sworn in as the first vice president of the United States, nine days before George Washington's presidential inauguration. 🇺🇸
1934: The Daily Mail printed a photograph that reportedly depicted the small head and neck of the Loch Ness monster. 🐍
1977: Annie, a popular musical based on the newspaper comic strip Little Orphan Annie, first opened on Broadway. 🎭
1986: American journalist Geraldo Rivera opened a vault that was found in the former headquarters of Chicago gangster Al Capone; however, he and an estimated 30 million TV viewers discovered that it was empty. 📺
Holidays:
Natale Di Roma 🇮🇹 (Rome)
Civil Service Day 🇮🇳
National Tea Day 🇬🇧
National Tree Planting Day 🇰🇪
Featured Birthdays:
1729: Catherine the Great 🇷🇺 (Empress)
1864: Max Weber 🇩🇪 (Sociologist)
1926: Elizabeth II 🇬🇧 (Queen)
1959: Robert Smith 🇬🇧 (Rock Singer)
Featured Deaths:
1910: Mark Twain 🇺🇸 (Author)
2003: Nina Simone 🇺🇸 (Singer)
2016: Prince 🇺🇸 (Singer)
2025: Pope Francis 🇦🇷 (Pope)
In one, Remus and Romulus built Rome together and decided to seek the gods' answer to the question of for whom the city ought be named with a bit of augury. Remus saw 6 birds, then Romulus saw 12. Remus claimed the gods favored him because he saw his birds first; Romulus, on the other hand, claimed the gods favored him because he saw more. A fight ensued and Romulus killed his brother.
The other story is that Romulus was busy building the walls of their new city. Since he had only lain a few courses of bricks thus far, Remus came over and mocked his brother by jumping back and forth over the walls. Romulus, enraged, smote his twin with a shovel.
In some tellings, Remus simply fell over dead after jumping over the walls with no help from Romulus at all -- it was the gods who were outraged by the insult. Sometimes it is a partisan of Romulus called Celer or Fabius who performed the bloody deed.