Arianna in Creta

Long before the action of the opera, King Minos of Crete fought a war with King Aegeus of Athens, who had killed Minos' baby son and carried away his baby daughter. The girl, however, had been brought up by an ally of Athens', King Archeus of Thebes, in the belief that she was his own child. Athens had to pay tribute to Crete as a term of ending the war – once every seven years seven Athenian youths and seven Athenian maidens had to be sent to Crete to be devoured by the Minotaur, a half-man, half-bull monster that lurked in a labyrinth from which escape was all but impossible. The human sacrifice of Athenians can only be ended by a hero slaying the Minotaur and defeating the Cretan warrior Tauride. The Athenian hero Teseo is on the way to Crete, resolved to do this and end his peoples' suffering, and to join with Arianna, whom he loves, and whom Minos has demanded as a hostage to ensure that the Athenian young people will be sent for sacrifice. The Athenians embark in Crete, alongside a stone tablet with the terms of the Athenian tribute inscribed on it. King Minos agrees to Teseo's request that Arianna be freed. Among the Athenian maidens sent to be sacrificed is Carilda, whose beauty is noticed by the Cretan champion Tauride; he instantly falls in love with her. Carilda is however secretly in love with Teseo and is interested in neither Tauride or the Athenian youth Alceste, who is also in love with Carilda. Teseo tells his beloved Arianna that he is determined to slay the…

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