About the work
Favola dramatica musicale in a prologue and three acts by Francesco Cavalli, the second libretto Giovanni Faustini wrote for him. It premiered in autumn 1643 at the Teatro San Cassiano in Venice.
Plot
The lovers Egisto and Climene, and Lidio and Clori, once separated by pirates, are reunited on their return but are then driven apart again by jealousy, sorcery and the interference of the gods Apollo and Venus – Egisto even descends into madness over it. Only after Apollo intervenes is the confusion resolved and the original couples reunited.
Cultural significance
Egisto's extended mad scene in Act 2 is considered one of the most striking of early opera. Highly successful in Cavalli's lifetime, the work was restaged into the 1660s in cities including Genoa, Florence, Bologna, Ferrara, Naples and Bergamo.