Cities of Myth

1. Introduction: The Metropolitans of Myth

City myths occupy a unique category within world mythology. Unlike gardens, caves, or mountains, cities do not belong purely to the natural world—they are constructed by human hands or divine decree. Consequently, the narratives surrounding them operate differently than tales of wild wilderness or primordial realms.

• The Mythological Status of Cities: Urban myths often straddle the line between playful tall tales (unserious stories like El Dorado) and hyper-serious historical realities (such as archaeological sites like Troy or Jericho).
• El Dorado as Metaphor: Though popularly sought as a physical city of gold in South America, El Dorado functions more as a metaphor for an ultimate, unattainable human prize.
• The Ambiguity of Urban Lore: Living, breathing cities must conduct daily commerce while simultaneously functioning as massive repositories of collective stories, making their mythologies complex and morally ambivalent.

2. Jericho and the Archaeology of the Walls

Jericho stands as one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in human history, yet it is mythologically famous for its miraculous destruction recorded in the Hebrew Bible.

• The Biblical Account: According to the Book of Joshua (Chapter 6), the Lord commands Joshua to march his army around the city walls once a day for six days, accompanied by seven priests blowing ram's horns and carrying the Ark of the Covenant.
• The Seventh Day: On the seventh day, the army circles the city seven times. Upon the final blast of the trumpets and a collective war cry, the massive city walls collapse instantly.
• The Historical Disconnect:
  Structure & Concept Flow

  Copy DiagramCopy

  Biblical Narrative -> Divine command, ram's horns, collapsing stone walls

  vs.

  Archaeological Reality -> Long-standing debate over whether a walled city even existed during Joshua's timeline; trumpets did not bring down ancient fortifications.

   
• Etiological Limits: While etiological explanations (stories explaining how things came to be) are common in mythology, it is frequently impossible to neatly reconcile religious myths with hard archaeological evidence.

3. Jerusalem: The Changing Face of a Holy Site

Jerusalem represents a living city shared across the three major Abrahamic religions. Across centuries of conquest and exile, the mythological imagery used to describe Jerusalem shifted dramatically based on historical trauma.

• Jerusalem During the Babylonian Captivity (6th Century BCE):
  • Following Emperor Nebuchadnezzar's sack of Jerusalem and the exile of the Jewish population, the prophet Jeremiah expressed profound ambivalence and pain.
  • In Lamentations, Jerusalem is personified as a disgraced, unclean woman or a desolate widow:

    "How doth the city sit solitary, that was full of people! She is become as a widow..." (Lamentations 1:1) "Jerusalem hath grievously sinned; therefore she is become as an unclean thing..." (Lamentations 1:8-9)

• The New Jerusalem:
  • Centuries later, in the New Testament Book of Revelation, the imagery transforms entirely.
  • John envisions an idealized, purified spiritual home descending from heaven:

    "And I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband." (Revelation 21:2)

4. Rome: The Epic Foundation of Aeneas

For early Western civilization, the ideal city-state was often Rome. Roman mythology carefully cultivated a legendary history rooted in heroism, family lineages, and brutal violence.

• The Trojan Connection (The Aeneid):
  • Virgil’s epic poem traces Rome's ultimate lineage back to the Trojan hero Aeneas.
  • Escaping the burning sack of Troy with his father Anchises and household gods, Aeneas settles in Italy and marries Lavinia.
  • In Book Six of The Aeneid, Aeneas visits the underworld where Anchises prophesies the future rise of Rome under a descendant named Romulus.
• The Lineage Breakdown:
  Structure & Concept Flow

  Copy DiagramCopy

  Trojan War -> Aeneas escapes Troy -> Settles in Latium (Alba Longa) -> Descendant Romulus builds the City of Seven Hills

   

5. Romulus, Remus, and the Founding Bloodshed

The foundational myth of Romulus and Remus is a masterclass in how ancient cultures wove divine parentage, violence, and fratricide into the birth of an empire.

• Divine Parentage and Abandonment:
  • Rhea Silvia, living in Alba Longa, is pursued and impregnated by Mars, the god of war.
  • Enraged King Amulius imprisons Rhea and orders her newborn twin sons (Romulus and Remus) cast out on the banks of the Tiber River.
• The She-Wolf and the Shepherd:
  • A gentle she-wolf suckles the abandoned infants before a shepherd named Faustulus discovers and raises them.
• Revenge and Return:
  • Raised in rough conditions, the twins turn to crime and rustle Amulius's sheep. Remus is captured, leading Faustulus to reveal their true royal identity.
  • Romulus storms Alba Longa, kills King Amulius, frees Remus, and restores their grandfather Numitor to the throne before setting out to found their own city.

6. The Thoughtbubble: Palatine Hill and the Rape of the Sabine Women

The drama of Rome's birth continued immediately upon the twins selecting a site for their new settlement.

• The Fratricidal Border Dispute:
  • Romulus chooses the Palatine hill (signaled by birds) and marks the sacred boundary (pomerium) by digging a trench.
  • Remus camps on the Aventine hill and mockingly leaps across Romulus's ditch to prove it is not invasion-proof.
  • Enraged by this sacrilege, Romulus kills Remus, establishing himself as sole ruler of "Rome" (rather than "Reem").
• Populating the City of Outcasts:
  • With a city site but no population, Romulus opens the Palatine hill as a sanctuary for criminals, runaways, and outcasts.
  • To solve the severe gender imbalance, the Romans invite neighboring tribes to a harvest festival and orchestrate the mass abduction and rape of the Sabine women to force population growth.
• The Sanitization vs. Reality of Myth: This brutal origin story highlights how foundational myths frequently gloss over, justify, or even glamorize severe violence and conquest.

7. Summary and Key Takeaways

• Man-Made Realms: Unlike natural mythic sites (gardens, caves, mountains), cities are constructed spaces whose myths reflect human politics, ambition, and community struggles.
• Tall Tales vs. History: City myths range from unserious tall tales (El Dorado) to heavily mythologized archaeological sites (Jericho, Troy).
• Etymological and Historical Limits: Archaeological records rarely align neatly with miraculous legendary events, such as trumpet blasts collapsing ancient fortifications.
• Shifting Urban Imagery: Sacred cities like Jerusalem undergo massive metaphorical transformations in literature—shifting from disgraced, unclean outcasts during wartime captivity to idealized brides in prophetic visions.
• The Epic Legacy of Rome: Roman myth tied its imperial legitimacy directly to heroic Trojan ancestry through Virgil’s Aeneid.
• Divine and Feral Beginnings: The tale of Romulus and Remus merges divine parentage (Mars) with feral survival (the she-wolf) to explain the aggressive nature of Roman expansion.
• Fratricide and Boundaries: Romulus's murder of Remus over a boundary marker establishes sacred law and absolute sovereignty through bloodshed.
• Glouced-Over Violence: Foundation myths frequently normalize dark realities—such as outcasts, fratricide, and mass abduction—as necessary steps in building civilization.
• Moral Ambiguity: Ultimately, mythical cities reflect human reality: they are profoundly ambivalent, morally complex spaces capable of both unifying humanity and perpetrating immense violence.