Love and MythA website by Studio Esoterico CornelioLegendary couples
Every civilisation has told its own story partly through its pairs of lovers. In this section we meet twenty of them, chosen from Greek and Latin myth, chivalric romance, Persian poetry, Indian epic and the legends of the Far East. Some are divine figures, such as Isis and Osiris; others are historical people, such as Abelard and Heloise or Shah Jahan and Mumtaz Mahal; others again live only in the verses of poets, from Ovid to Shakespeare. For each one we trace the sources that have handed down its story, carefully distinguishing what is documented from what belongs to tradition and legend. We then follow the fortunes of these lovers in painting, sculpture, theatre and music, down to the opera of the 19th century. What emerges is a varied panorama: tragic loves and loves faithful into old age, passions that defy kings and families, waits lasting twenty years, forbidden glances and bridges of magpies hanging among the stars.
Orpheus and Eurydice: the song that defied death
Orpheus descends to the underworld to win back Eurydice and loses her with a single glance: the myth in Virgil and Ovid, its ancient readings and its operas.
3 min read02Cupid and Psyche, the tale of the soul in Apuleius' Metamorphoses
From the forbidden lamp to the trials set by Venus: the tale of Cupid and Psyche told by Apuleius in the 2nd century and its legacy from Raphael to Canova.
3 min read03Tristan and Isolde, the passion born of a potion
The Celtic legend of Tristan and Isolde in the romances of Béroul, Thomas and Gottfried: the potion drunk by mistake, King Mark, black sails and Wagner's opera.
3 min read04Paolo and Francesca, the lovers of the fifth canto of the Inferno
The true story of Francesca da Polenta and Paolo Malatesta and how Dante transformed it in the fifth canto of the Inferno: the storm, the go-between book, pity.
3 min read05Layla and Majnun, the lover driven mad in the Arabian desert
From Bedouin legend to Nizami's Persian poem of 1188: the story of Qays, called Majnun, and of Layla, and its legacy from Persia to the opera stage of Baku.
3 min read06Shah Jahan and Mumtaz Mahal, the love that built the Taj Mahal
The story of the Mughal emperor Shah Jahan and his wife Mumtaz Mahal, who died in 1631, and of the Agra mausoleum raised in her memory on the Yamuna.
3 min read07Abelard and Heloise, the philosopher and his pupil in 12th-century Paris
Peter Abelard and Heloise: the love born in Paris around 1100, the secret marriage, Fulbert's revenge, the Paraclete and the famous letters between them.
3 min read08Pyramus and Thisbe, the lovers of Babylon and the blood-stained mulberry
Ovid's tale of Pyramus and Thisbe: the crack in the wall, the meeting at Ninus' tomb, the lioness and the mulberry tree, down to Shakespeare and Baroque poetry.
3 min read09Hero and Leander, the lamp burning over the Hellespont
Leander swims the Hellespont each night to reach Hero, guided by a lamp: the myth in Musaeus and Ovid, down to Lord Byron's own crossing of the strait in 1810.
3 min read10Philemon and Baucis, the oak and the linden of faithfulness
Two poor old people of Phrygia welcome Jupiter and Mercury in disguise and are granted to die together, turned into trees: Ovid's myth and its legacy.
3 min read11Romeo and Juliet, from the Italian novella to Shakespeare's tragedy
Before Shakespeare came Masuccio, Luigi da Porto and Bandello: Romeo and Juliet from the Italian novellas to the English stage and on to the Verona of today.
3 min read12Dante and Beatrice, from a Florentine meeting to Paradise
Beatrice in the Vita Nova and the Comedy: the meeting at the age of nine, the greeting, her death in 1290 and the beloved woman's change into a guide to God.
3 min read13Petrarch and Laura, the laurel, the breeze and love turned into poetry
On 6 April 1327 in Avignon Petrarch saw Laura for the first time: the story of the Canzoniere, the wordplay on her name and the riddle of her true identity.
3 min read14Lancelot and Guinevere, the love that divided the Round Table
From Chrétien de Troyes to the prose cycle and Malory: how the love between Lancelot and Queen Guinevere led to the fall of King Arthur's realm and of Camelot.
3 min read15Odysseus and Penelope, twenty years of waiting and an olive-wood bed
In the Odyssey Penelope waits twenty years for Odysseus, tricks the suitors with her weaving and knows him by the secret of the bed: a tale of clever fidelity.
3 min read16Dido and Aeneas, the queen of Carthage and the fleeing hero
In the fourth book of the Aeneid Dido loves Aeneas, who leaves her to obey his destiny: the tragedy of the queen of Carthage from Virgil to Purcell and Berlioz.
3 min read17Isis and Osiris, the wife who made the god whole again
The Egyptian myth of Isis and Osiris: Seth's trick, the chest cast into the Nile, the search for the scattered limbs and the birth of Horus, told by Plutarch.
3 min read18Savitri and Satyavan, the wife who overcame the god of death
In the Mahabharata Princess Savitri follows Yama, lord of the dead, and by her wisdom wins back her husband Satyavan's life: an Indian myth and its legacy.
3 min read19The cowherd and the weaver girl, lovers parted by the Milky Way
The Chinese legend of Niulang and Zhinü, Altair and Vega parted by the Silver River, the magpie bridge and the Qixi festival, also known in Japan and Korea.
3 min read20Khosrow and Shirin, the king, the princess and the sculptor Farhad
From the Sasanian king Khosrow II to Nizami's poem: the love story of Khosrow and Shirin, Farhad's sacrifice on Mount Bisotun and the legend's long legacy.
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