Mythological History
In Virgil's Aeneid, and also according to Livy, the Rutuli are led by Turnus, a young prince to whom Latinus, king of the Latins, had promised the hand of his daughter Lavinia in marriage. When the Trojans arrive in Italy, Latinus decides to give his daughter to Aeneas because of instructions he had received from the gods to marry his daughter to a foreigner. Turnus is outraged and leads his people as well as several other Italian tribes against the Trojans in war. Virgil's text ends when Aeneas defeats Turnus in single combat and therefore gains the right to marry Lavinia. In some other accounts of the story of Aeneas, he is later killed in a subsequent battle with them.
Read more about this topic: Rutuli
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