Cy apres sensuit de dido autrement appellee elisse laquelle sut royne de cartage · Centre for Early Modern Visual Culture

Title: Cy apres sensuit de dido autrement appellee elisse laquelle sut royne de cartage
Subject: Elissa; Acerbas; Important Women; Famous Women; Chastity; Dido
Period: 1400-1450;
Geographic: North Africa; Carthage
Description: Dido, the founder and queen of Carthage, is illustrated on top of the city’s walls in the top centre of the image stabbing herself with a knife. After her husband, Acerbas, had been killed by her brother, she fled to Africa and founded Carthage and vowed to remain chaste in honour of her husband. When a foreign king asked for Dido’s hand in marriage and threatened to sack the city if she denied, she stabbed herself to protect her chastity.
Image Creator: Anonymous (Illuminator)
Type: Text; Illumination
Identifier: mta:18453
Language: frm
Source Name: Livre que fist Jehan BOCACE de Certalde des cleres et nobles femmes, lequel il envoia à Audice de Accioroles de Florence, contesse de Haulteville [Book from Giovanni Boccaccio of Certaldo called the cleric and noble women, of which he sent to Audice Accioroles of Florence, Countess of Haulteville]
Parent Collection: 1401 Florence; 1401 Florence
Image: mta_18453_OBJ.jpg
Collection: Early Modern Women
Subject: Elissa; Acerbas; Important Women; Famous Women; Chastity; Dido