Gabriella di Vergy

Gabriella di Vergy
Opera seria by Gaetano Donizetti
The young composer, who wrote the opera in 1826
Librettist	Andrea Leone Tottola
Language	Italian
Based on	Dormont De Belloy's Gabrielle de Vergy
Premiere	29 November 1869 (1869-11-29) Teatro San Carlo, Naples

Gabriella di Vergy is an opera seria in two acts by Gaetano Donizetti written in 1826 and revised in 1838, from a libretto by Andrea Leone Tottola, which was based on the tragedy Gabrielle de Vergy (1777) by Dormont De Belloy. Prior to that, the play was itself inspired by two French medieval legends, Le châtelain de Coucy et la dame de Fayel and Le Roman de la chastelaine de Vergy.

The story had already been the subject of an opera by Michele Carafa (1816) and had previously been used by Johann Simon Mayr (Raul di Créqui, Milan, 1809), Francesco Morlacchi (Raoul de Créqui, Dresden, 1811), and Carlo Coccia (Fayel, Florence, 1817). It was also subsequently used as Gabriella di Vergy by Saverio Mercadante in 1828.

"In its original form the opera was never performed",^[1] but parts of the original version were re-used by Donizetti in his other operas Otto mesi in due ore (Naples, 1827), L’esule di Roma (Naples 1828), Il paria (Naples 1829) and Anna Bolena. For the revised version, Donizetti revisited Gabriella di Vergy and incorporated into the opera parts of Ugo, conte di Parigi (Milan 1832), Rosmonda d'Inghilterra (Florence 1834) and Maria de Rudenz (Venice 1838).