Dido and Aeneas

Dido and Aeneas is an opera by the English Baroque composer Henry Purcell, from a libretto by Nahum Tate. It was composed in 1689 and hence is given catalogue number Z. 626. It comprises three acts and lasts about an hour.

The original Aeneid

You have probably heard of Odysseus or as some call him Ulysses, the famed Greek hero. Well the Trojans had a hero with many wanderings also. Aeneas and his men sailed to Italy and settled to start a supreme race. The gods prophesied this. The race would develop into the Romans with an Empire that would be almost endless. However, Aeneas had to get to Italy or none of this would happen.

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Virgil?s Aeneid, written between 26 and 19 B.C., is Rome?s national epic. It tells how a band of Trojans, commanded by Aeneas, escapes by sea after the bloody Trojan War; the descendants of these men are the founders of Rome. The Aeneid also tells of the nearly simultaneous founding of Carthage and of Aeneas?s brief sojourn there, in the arms of Queen Dido.

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Aeneas and his men set off with suspense. First they reached a island with a mountain. They found plenty of animals to feast upon. But as they called upon the gods to enjoy the feast with them, large winged creatures with terrible claws called Harpies stole the food they wanted and fouled up the meat they left. Aeneas and his men could not stand this any longer and they left. They then reached the city of a prophet named Helenus. Helenus told them that their route to Italy on the west -middle side, not to go through the current where the dreadful Scylla, monster in the cave, could eat men with any desire and Charybdis, the whirl pool who could suck anyone in with nothing left, lived.

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Helenus did not know what Juno (Hera) had in mind. As Aeneas set sail remembering Helenus' instructions, Juno devised a plan. Juno went to the island of Aeolia. She talked with king Aeolus and told him that she wanted the Trojans to face a storm that would kill them. King Aeolus obeyed the instructions for he was a lesser god than Juno or Jupiter (Zeus). He released his winds from the cave by striking the cave mighty with his spear. When Aeneas got to channel of Scylla and Charybdis he went around and then the mighty winds hit the ships. The waves crashed all might as the ships got battered. Noticing this Neptune (Poiseidon) calmed the winds and silenced the ocean with the most pure silence the ocean had ever seen, for the ocean was his territory. Aeneas and the men left were blown near the shore of Libya. Some stories say the other men were taken in by a whirl pool and others say they were just blown off to Sicily.

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Aeneas now only had seven ships. Once they arrived they set out to explore the land. On one of their findings they came upon Venus (Aphrodite) disguised as a huntress. This disguise did not fool Aeneas. He knew right away this had to be a goddess because of her perfect beauty. She told them they were in Carthage and guided them into the main city. In some versions, as they walked they were protected by a fog and in other no one could see them until they arrived.

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When Aeneas saw the city, he gazed upon how the workers were so thrifty and how the city moved so quickly. Aeneas arrived at the palace and met Dido the Queen who fled from her brother when he killed her father, to this land where she developed a great city. Aeneas immediately said they were not there to fight and asked if they have help to get where they were going, and stay there in the meantime. Dido, the Tyrrian, said she would not judge anyone no matter where they came from. Queen Dido welcomes the exhausted refugees to Carthage, for she has heard of the ?acts and heroes? of the Trojan War.

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Venus knew that soon Juno would find out and would kill Aeneas some way, so she sent cupid to set the fire and desire of passion in Dido's body for Aeneas. Quickly Dido gave many luxuries to Aeneas and asked him to talk about his adventures.

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He told the tragic story of Troy. Even with all the sadness in the story Dido wanted to hear they story over and over again because she was under a spell of passion when Juno saw this, she could not do anything to hurt poor Dido.

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After a while, the god Jupiter, however, becomes angry that Aeneas is dallying with Dido; he sends Mercury down to remind the Trojan leader that his destiny is to found Rome. Mercury finds Aeneas dressed in a Tyrian purple cloak woven for him by Dido and tells the Trojan leader that he must fulfill the fate ordained by the gods. Aeneas, dazed, now ?burns to flee from Carthage.? In some versions, the evil monster, Rumor got to Dido and told her Aeneas's plans. In other versions, she sensed it herself.

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She sent out for Aeneas and to avoid a commotion Aeneas came. She was outraged. She had give him a place to stay gifts, honor, part of the kingdom, anything. All for him as she lost respect from the people, power, and a good city. She longed for him and basically gave up her life for him. Now he was to leave without something to show, not even a baby. He said he would never forget her but he had to go. She allowed him to not stay in her presence, but she was plotting a way to stop his departure. That same night Mercury came again but in a dream which seemed so much more powerful and intense. Aeneas immediately took his men and they got the ships ready.

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When Dido finds out that he plans to leave, she becomes mad with rage. Dido knew it was too late, so she prayed for Aeneas to be doomed to the goddess that hated him, Juno. Then with things Aeneas left behind, Dido burned funeral pyre. she took her own life by the sword to end her misery and in other versions to relieved her from the evils of life. Dido then turns her rage upon herself.

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Aeneas and his men were out to sea when they noticed this great funeral fire which his the lust with which both Dido and Aeneas had for each other. Passion which Dido was cursed by and the love which was an unbroken contract of memory which would last like the eternal flame above the world. Aeneas feared with sadness that the fire was that of Dido. Aeneas, having sailed for Italy, is unaware that Dido has killed herself, though he later hears rumors.

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But the two meet up again, when Aeneas journeys to the Underworld to speak to his father, Anchises, one last time. There he encounters a ?forest of shadows?.

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