TARPEIA  , in

Roman legend, daughter of the commander of the Capitol during the war with the Sabines caused by the rape of the Sabine women . According to the common story, she offered to betray the citadel, if the Sabines would give her what they wore on their left arms, meaning their bracelets; instead of this, keeping to the letter of their promise, they threw their shields upon her and crushed her to death . Simylus, a Greek elegiac poet, makes Tarpeia betray the Capitol to a king of the Gauls . The story may be an attempt to account for the Tarpeian rock being chosen as the place of execution of traitors . According to S . Reinach, however, in Revue archeologique, xi . (1908), the story had its origin in a rite—the taboo of military spoils, which led to their being heaped up on consecrated ground that they might not be touched . Tarpeia herself is a local divinity, the manner of whose death was suggested by the tumulus or shields on the spot devoted to her cult, a crime being invented to account for the supposed punishment .