About the work
Dramma per musica in a prologue and three acts by Francesco Cavalli, to the only libretto Aurelio Aureli wrote for him. It premiered on 30 December 1655 at the Teatro Sant’Apollinare in Venice.
Plot
Princess Erismena, living in disguise as a slave, dresses as a soldier to track down her unfaithful lover Idraspe, while her own father, King Erimante of Media, is tormented by inexplicable nightmares. After a chain of mistaken identities involving the disguised Erismena and her rival Aldimira, the king finally recognises his long-lost daughter by a medallion; Erismena is reunited with Idraspe, and Aldimira is married off to Orimeno.
Cultural significance
With its memorable arias, Erismena became one of Cavalli's greatest stage successes and was restaged in at least 13 further Italian productions over the following two decades. An adaptation made around 1673/74 for English taste is considered among the earliest known complete translations of an Italian opera into English.