When Lucretia refused the advances of Sextus, he threatened to kill her and then put a dead slave in bed with her to make it look as if she had been caught in adultery. She gave way under this threat to her reputation, and then after Sextus had left, sent for her (husband and) father, who were away with the troops fighting a war. She told them (or just her father) something terrible had happened and asked each of them to bring a friend as a witness. Her father brought Publius Valerius and her husband brought Lucius Junius Brutus, the king's nephew. (510 BC)
Lucretia told the gathered men what had happened and then stabbed herself before their eyes. Brutus vowed vengeance on Tarquin and his children, and led the citizens in deposing the king and exiling the royal family. Rather than appoint a new king, the Romans instituted the Republic with Brutus and Collatinus as its first consuls.
