Chariot racing at the Circus Maximus

c. 600 BCEMajor

Rome lays out a racetrack in the valley below the Palatine, by tradition under its early kings. Rebuilt over centuries, it becomes the largest venue of the ancient world and makes chariot racing Rome's mass sport.

Longest chain: The Big Bang → First stars ignite → Supernovae seed heavy elements → The Sun forms → Earth forms → First oceans → First life → Photosynthesis evolves → Great Oxidation Event → Complex cells (eukaryotes) → Multicellular life → First animals → Cambrian Explosion → First vertebrates → Jawed fish → Fish walk onto land → The amniotic egg → The Great Dying → Dinosaurs appear → Asteroid ends the dinosaurs → Early primates → Apes split from monkeys → Human line splits from chimpanzees → Walking upright → First stone tools → Genus Homo appears → Homo erectus → Control of fire → First fired clay figures → First pottery → Potter's wheel → The wheel → Spoke-wheeled chariot → Hittite Empire → Iron Age begins → Rome founded (traditional date) → Chariot racing at the Circus Maximus