According to

Roman mythology Roman mythology is the body of myths of ancient Rome as represented in the literature and visual arts of the Romans. One of a wide variety of genres of Roman folklore, ''Roman mythology'' may also refer to the modern study of these representa ...

, Amata (also called Palanto) was the wife of

Latinus Latinus ( la, Latinus; Ancient Greek: Λατῖνος, ''Latînos'', or Λατεῖνος, ''Lateînos'') was a figure in both Greek and Roman mythology. He is often associated with the heroes of the Trojan War, namely Odysseus and Aeneas. Al ...

, king of the

Latins The Latins were originally an Italic tribe in ancient central Italy from Latium. As Roman power and colonization spread Latin culture during the Roman Republic. Latins culturally "Romanized" or "Latinized" the rest of Italy, and the word Latin ...

, and the mother of their only child,

Lavinia In Roman mythology, Lavinia ( ; ) is the daughter of Latinus and Amata, and the last wife of Aeneas. Creation It has been proposed that the character was in part intended to represent Servilia Isaurica, Emperor Augustus's first fiancée. Sto ...

. In the

Aeneid The ''Aeneid'' ( ; la, Aenē̆is or ) is a Latin epic poem, written by Virgil between 29 and 19 BC, that tells the legendary story of Aeneas, a Trojan who fled the fall of Troy and travelled to Italy, where he became the ancestor of ...

Virgil Publius Vergilius Maro (; traditional dates 15 October 7021 September 19 BC), usually called Virgil or Vergil ( ) in English, was an ancient Roman poet of the Augustan period. He composed three of the most famous poems in Latin literature: th ...

, she commits suicide during the conflict between

Aeneas In Greco-Roman mythology, Aeneas (, ; from ) was a Trojan hero, the son of the Trojan prince Anchises and the Greek goddess Aphrodite (equivalent to the Roman Venus). His father was a first cousin of King Priam of Troy (both being grandsons ...

and

Turnus Turnus ( grc, Τυρρηνός, Tyrrhênós) was the legendary King of the Rutuli in Roman history, and the chief antagonist of the hero Aeneas in Virgil's ''Aeneid''. According to the ''Aeneid'', Turnus is the son of Daunus and the nymph Ve ...

over which of them would marry Lavinia. When Aeneas asks for Lavinia's hand, Amata objects, because she has already been promised to Turnus, the king of the Rutulians. Hiding her daughter in the woods, she enlists the other Latin women to instigate a war between the two. Turnus, and his ally Mezentius, leader of the

Etruscans The Etruscan civilization () was developed by a people of Etruria in ancient Italy with a common language and culture who formed a federation of city-states. After conquering adjacent lands, its territory covered, at its greatest extent, roug ...

, are defeated by Aeneas with the assistance of the Pelasgian colonists from Arcadia and Italic natives of

Pallantium Pallantium ( grc, Παλλάντιον) was an ancient city near the Tiber river on the Italian peninsula. Roman mythology, as recounted in Virgil's ''Aeneid'' for example, states that the city was founded by Evander of Pallene and other ancie ...

, led by that city's founder, the Arcadian Evander of Pallene. The story of this conflict fills the greater part of the seventh book of

's ''

''. When Amata believes that Turnus had fallen in battle, she hangs herself. Amata's suicide is also referred to in Canto 17 of '' Purgatorio'', the second canticle of

Dante Alighieri Dante Alighieri (; – 14 September 1321), probably baptized Durante di Alighiero degli Alighieri and often referred to as Dante (, ), was an Italian poet, writer and philosopher. His '' Divine Comedy'', originally called (modern Italian: ...

's ''

Divine Comedy The ''Divine Comedy'' ( it, Divina Commedia ) is an Italian narrative poem by Dante Alighieri, begun 1308 and completed in around 1321, shortly before the author's death. It is widely considered the pre-eminent work in Italian literature a ...

'', to demonstrate dreadful effects of anger. Dante imagines a mournful Lavinia, reproaching her mother, Amata, for the grief which her suicide has inflicted. Parallels have been drawn between Dante and his representation of Amata in ''Purgatorio''. After his exile from Florence and the Black Guelph takeover, Dante may have experienced that same self-recrimination experienced by Amata, which led to her suicide.

References

* Characters in Roman mythology Characters in the Aeneid Mythological queens Latins (Italic tribe) {{AncientRome-myth-stub