Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology/Amata

by William Smith

AMA'TA, the wife of king Latinus and mother of Lavinia, who, when Aeneas sued for the hand of the latter, opposed him, because she had already promised Lavinia to Turnus. At the same time she was instigated by Alecto, who acted according to the request of Juno, to stir up the war with Turnus. This story fills the greater part of the seventh book of Virgil's Aeneid. When Amata was informed that Turnus had fallen in battle, she hung herself. (Virg. Aen. xii. 600 ; Dionys. i. 64.) [L. S.]