Thomyris, Queen Of Scythia
''Thomyris, Queen of Scythia'' was a pasticcio opera based on a libretto by Peter Anthony Motteux. It was produced by John James Heidegger at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane in April 1707. Motteux’s prologue directly referenced Anne, Queen of Great Britain, under whose reign female stage protagonists were very popular. Action The opera is named after the historical queen Tomyris, mentioned by Herodotus as the killer of Cyrus the Great. However the action of the opera is based on a love triangle between entirely fictional characters; Thomyris’ son prince Orontes and the Armenian king Tigranes, who are rivals for the affections of the Persian princess Cleora. Cleora, held captive by Orontes, falls in love with him although she is betrothed to Tigranes. The original 1707 version of the opera concludes when Thomyris intervenes to prevent the Scythians from sacrificing Cleora; she has received false news of Orontes’s death, while Tigranes is wounded in battle. In the 1709 version ...
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Tomiris
Tomyris (; grc, Τόμυρις, Tómuris; Latin: ) also called Thomyris, Tomris, or Tomiride, reigned over the Massagetae, an Iranian Saka people of Central Asia. Tomyris led her armies to defend against an attack by Cyrus the Great of the Achaemenid Empire, and, according to Herodotus, defeated and killed him in 530 BC. Name The name is the Latin form of the Ancient Greek name (), which is itself the Hellenisation of a Scythian name meaning "of family" derived from a cognate of the Avestan word () and of the Old Persian word (), meaning "seed," "germ," and "kinship," and of which various reconstructed forms have been proposed, including: * or * or * or * or * or History Background Tomyris was the widowed wife of the king of the Massagetae, whom she succeeded as the queen of the tribe after he died. War with Persia When the founder of the Persian Achaemenid Empire, Cyrus, asked for the hand of Tomyris with the intent of acquiring her kingdom through the ...
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