She-Wolf (Lupa) and suckling twins Romulus and Remus

Before Romulus and Remus were born, their grandfather Numitor and his brother Amulius, descendants of fugitives from Troy, received the throne of Alba Longa upon their fathers death. Numitor received the sovereign powers as his birthright while Amulius received the royal treasury, including the gold Aeneas brought with him from Troy.
Because Amulius held the treasury, thus having more power than his brother, he dethroned Numitor as the rightful king. Out of fear that Numitors daughter, Rhea Silvia, would produce children who one day would overthrow him as king, he forced Rhea to become a Vestal Virgin, a priestess sworn to abstinence. But Mars, god of war, (in Greek, Ares) was smitten by her and secretly while she slept bore her two sons. They were twin boys, as told, of remarkable size and beauty, later named Romulus and Remus. Amulius was enraged and ordered Rhea and the twins killed. Accounts vary on how; in one account, he had Rhea buried alive (the standard punishment for Vestal Virgins who violated their vow of celibacy) and ordered the death of the twins by exposure; In another, he ordered Rhea and the twins thrown into the Tiber.
The servant ordered to kill the twins could not, however, because they were too beautiful and innocent. The servant placed the two in a basket and laid the basket on the banks of the Tiber river and went away. The river, which was in flood, rose and gently carried the basket and the twins downstream.
Romulus and Remus were kept safe by the river deity Tiberinus, who made the cradle catch in the roots of a fig tree growing in the Velabrum swamp, which therefore, has a high symbolic significance. He then brought the infant twins up onto the Palatine Hill. There, they were nursed by a wolf, Lupa in Latin. Lupa is a name for the priestesses of a fox goddess, leading to an alternative theory that the wolf was human. There is speculation that the nurturers were harlots (she-wolf being a name for them in ancient Rome) They were nurtured underneath a fig tree and were fed by a woodpecker named Picus. Both animals were sacred to Mars.
Romulus and Remus were then discovered by Faustulus, a shepherd for Amulius, who brought the children to his home. Faustulus and his wife, Acca Larentia, raised the boys as their own. The roots of her name imply a religious cult of an earth mother. Some mythological traditions have her as the prostitute 'she-wolf' who suckled Rome's founders. This is because "lupa" means she-wolf or prostitute; leading to lupanar, meaning "brothel".