Pyramus and Thisbe
Created By: Daphne Rios and Melanie Arambula

“...Now is he for the numbers that Petrarch flowed in. Laura, to his lady, was a kitchen wench (marry, she had a better love to berhyme her), Dido a dowdy, Cleopatra a gypsy, Helen and Hero hildings and harlots, Thisbe a gray eye or so, but not to the purpose. Signior Romeo, bonjour!...”


Act II Scene IV

The Story Of Pyramus and Thisbe

• Thisbe is a character that appears in the work Metamorphoses by the Roman poet Ovid. She lived in Babylon, and was the lover of Pyramus, both living in connected houses, but being forbidden to marry by their parents, who were rivals. However, the two lovers were able to express their feelings to each other through a crack in a wall, and decided to meet near the tomb of Ninus under a mulberry tree. Thisbe arrived first, but saw a lioness that had blood all over the mouth because of hunting; Thisbe, frightened, fled losing her veil in the process. When Pyramus arrived, he saw the veil, and horrified thinking that Thisbe was dead, fell on his sword and died. His blood fell on the white mulberry fruit, staining them. Thisbe returned shortly afterwards only to find Pyramus' body on the ground. She mourned and after a bit, she took the sword and killed herself with it. In the end, the gods, touched by Thisbe's mourning, decided to permanently turn the colour of the mulberry fruit to dark, reminding the relationship of the two young lovers. The story was told in Geoffrey Chaucer’s Legend of Good Women, and a farcical version is acted by the “rude mechanicals” in William Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream.

comparison to romeo and juliet

sources

• Dixon-Kennedy, Mike. "Pyramus and Thisbe." World History: Ancient and Medieval Eras, ABC-CLIO, 2017, ancienthistory.abc-clio.com/Search/Display/577384. Accessed 16 Mar. 2017.
• https://www.britannica.com/topic/Pyramus