About the work
Tragedia lirica in two acts by Gaetano Donizetti to a libretto by Pietro Salatino, first performed on 4 November 1832 at the Teatro San Carlo in Naples with Giuseppina Ronzi de Begnis in the title role.
Plot
In medieval Castile, Queen Sancia plans to marry the power-hungry Saracen Ircano to secure the succession, just as her son Garzia, long believed dead, unexpectedly returns. Ircano forces Sancia to poison her own son; to save Garzia, she drinks the poison herself and dies as he ascends the throne.
Cultural significance
With "Sancia di Castiglia" Donizetti wrote his sixth opera on a Spanish subject and the first with an entirely tragic outcome. The work succeeded at its premiere but was then largely forgotten; it returned to the stage only occasionally, in Bergamo in 1984 and in Madrid in 1992 with Montserrat Caballé in the title role.