Aeneas journey to come. However, the messenger god Mercury was sent by Jupiter and Venus to remind Aeneas of his journey and his purpose, compelling him to leave secretly. When Dido learned of this, she uttered a curse that would forever pit Carthage against Rome, an enmity that would culminate in the Punic Wars. She then committed suicide by stabbing herself with the same sword she gave Aeneas when they first met. After the sojourn in Carthage, the Trojans returned to Sicily where Aeneas organized funeral games to honor his father, who had died a year before. The company traveled on
Aeneid wings, but when Aeneas makes a daring attack at the city of Latium (causing the queen of Latium to hang herself in despair), he forces Turnus into single combat once more. Turnus's strength deserts him as he tries to hurl a rock, and Aeneas's spear goes through his thigh. As Turnus is begging on his knees for his life, the epic ends with Aeneas first tempted to obey pleas to spare Turnus's life, but killing him in rage when he sees that Turnus is wearing his friend Pallas's belt over a shoulder as a trophy. Critics of the "Aeneid" focus