Dido, Queen of Carthage (play)

Dido, Queen of Carthage
Title page of the first edition of Dido, Queen of Carthage
Written by	Christopher Marlowe, Thomas Nashe
Characters	Dido Aeneas Iarbas Achates
Date premiered	c. 1593
Place premiered	London
Original language	English
Subject	the story of Dido and Aeneas from the Aeneid.
Genre	tragedy
Setting	Carthage

Dido, Queen of Carthage (full title: The Tragedie of Dido Queene of Carthage) is a short play written by the English playwright Christopher Marlowe, with possible contributions by Thomas Nashe. It was probably written between 1587 and 1593, and was first published in 1594. The story focuses on the classical figure of Dido, the Queen of Carthage. It tells an intense dramatic tale of Dido and her fanatical love for Aeneas (induced by Cupid), Aeneas' betrayal of her and her eventual suicide on his departure for Italy. The playwrights relied on Books 1, 2, and 4 of Virgil's Aeneid as primary source.^{[citation needed]}