The traditional date for the founding of Rome, following Marcus Terentius Varro,is 21 April 753 BC, and the city and surrounding region of Latium has continued to be inhabited with little interruption since around that time. Recent (2014) excavations have revealed a wall built long before the city's official founding year. Archaeologists uncovered a stone wall, and pieces of pottery dating to the 9th century and the beginning of the 8th century, and there is evidence of people arriving on the Palatine hill as early as the 10th century BC