Chariclea (Theagenes and Chariclea)

Anon. (1572)

Historical Records

Payments for 'speares for the play Cariclia' and an 'Awlter [alter] for theagines' are listed in the Revels accounts of 1572/3 (Feuillerat 175, see also Feuillerat's note on page 454). Wiggins holds that, in the accounts, the mitres and a picture of Andromeda 'correspond with the source' and speculates on other possible items that may make reference to the play (Wiggins 92).

Theatrical Provenance

At Court

Probable Genre(s)

Romance. Melodrama.

Possible Narrative and Dramatic Sources or Analogues

The STC lists a printing of An Aethiopian History around 1569 that was translated from a Greek text by Thomas Underdowne (STC (2nd ed.), 13041). This story comes from Heliodorus of Emesa's history of Theagenes and Chariclea. This story of the Queen of Ethiopia is also translated from the French by James Sandford in 1567 in a supplement to his translation of a work entitled The Amorous and Tragicall Tales of Plutarch (STC (2nd ed.), 20072).

This same play was either revived or made from the same or similar sources for another lost play, entitled The Queen of Ethiopia in 1578.

In this romance, Chariclea, the daughter of King Hydaspes and Queen Persinna of Ethiopia, was born white because her mother gazed upon a painting of Andromeda while Chariclea was being conceived. This happened just after the queen was rescued by Perseus, which makes the queen fear being accused of adultery. So Persinna leaves the baby Chariclea in the care of Sisimithras, who takes the baby to Egypt and in turn leaves her in the care of a Pythian priest.

Chariclea is later taken to Delphi, and made a priestess of Artemis. When Theagenes the Thessalian comes to Delphi, the two fall in love. Theagenes runs off with Chariclea with the help of Calasiris, an Egyptian employed by Queen Persinna to find Chariclea. Theagenes and Chariclea go through a number of trials, having encounters with pirates and thieves. The plot culminates with Chariclea taken and offered as a sacrifice to the gods by her own father. But her birth is made known, and Chariclea and Theagenes are married.

References to the Play

In his 'Defense of Poesy' (1583), Sir Philip Sydney references the love story of Theagenes and Chariclea, which he calls that 'sugared invention' of Heliodorus (218). In the same essay he says that, with the exception of Gorboduc, the tragedies and comedies of his time had neither 'honest civility' nor 'skillful poetry.' If Sydney saw the play, which is (barely) possible, he was not impressed (243).

Critical Commentary

See Wiggins, serial number 536.

Lee Monroe Ellison in The Early Romantic Drama at the English Court makes the connection between Heliodorus and Revels account of the purchase of items for the production. The spears mentioned in the account in Ellison's view were 'probably intended to represent arms in the hands of Hydaspes's exultant soldiers,' and the alter mentioned in the Revels entry was probably the 'sacrificial alter upon whose heated golden bars the victims, Theagenes and Chariclea,are placed.' Ellison sees the story, particularly the one involving spears, as having 'all the elements of sensationalism necessary to recommend it to dramatists of this period.' He concludes that the tenth book, from which the story came, was 'capable of being served up as tolerable melodrama.

For What It's Worth

Wiggins mentions but then excludes certain items listed in the Revels accounts that were provided in the proximity 'on the balance of probability' (92). One is the possible provision for a monster, and a monster does appear at the end of the source. The Revels accounts have three references to a monster being constructed in the entries for 1572-73, clustered around this play. One is reminded again of Sydney's 'Defense,' in which he condemns the conventions of drama during his time and obliquely describes a play that has a 'hideous monster with fire and smoke' (243). In the context of Sydney's description the monster is ridiculous, along with other features of the unnamed play he describes. The general description he gives does not point specifically to this play, nor can we establish that this play had a monster, but it is worth noting the appearance of monsters and other unfeasible events on stages at court met with the lack of willing suspension of disbelief from Sydney and no doubt others. .

Works Cited

Ellison, Lee Monroe. The Early Romantic Drama at the English Court (Chicago, 1917).
Feuillerat, Revels
Wiggins, Volume II.

Site created and maintained by Thomas Dabbs, Aoyama Gakuin University; updated 19 May, 2016.