Shakespeare’s Cymbeline is a complex tale of betrayal and mistaken identity, inspired by historical texts and the Decameron. The character of Cymbeline is based on the historic British king Cunobelinus and the work of Geoffrey of Monmouth. The play centers on the relationship between Imogen and Posthumus Leonatus, opposed by the queen, Cloten, and Iachimo. The play’s structure includes cross-dressing and a dream sequence, and is seen as an experimentation with new elements in Jacobean drama.
Shakespeare’s Cymbeline is one of his last works. Built around the narrative of King Cymbeline’s battle against the Romans and his daughter Imogen’s love for the heroic Posthumus Leonatus, the play is a complicated tale of betrayal and mistaken identity. Shakespeare derived Cymbeline’s fiction from historical texts such as Holinshed’s Chronicle and Geoffrey of Monmouth’s History of the Kings of England. Other elements of the game originate with the Decameron, by the Italian author Giovanni Boccaccio.
Cunobelinus, a historic British king who reigned in what is now southeast England between the late 1st century BC and early 1st century AD, is the original inspiration for the character of Cymbeline. Though he was a powerful ruler, he was far from being the king of all of Great Britain. His rule is known from the works of Roman historians, as well as from archaeological evidence.
Shakespeare’s version of the character is based on the work of the 12th-century historian Geoffrey of Monmouth. Monmouth’s History of the Kings of Britain depicts Cymbeline as a great king and warrior, a leader who was both on friendly terms with Rome and able to resist Roman aggression when necessary. The king’s two sons, Guiderius and Arvirago, also appear in Monmouth’s story.
The conflict between the Britons and the Romans is only part of the plot of Shakespeare’s play. Much of the action centers on the relationship between Cymbeline’s daughter Imogen and her lover Posthumus Leonatus. The couple are opposed by the queen, her foolish son Cloten and the devious Iachimo, who persuades Leonato that Imogen has been unfaithful to him, forcing him to flee the court and she to chase him in disguise.
Iachimo manages to fool Leonatus by discovering that Imogen has a mole, a fact he could only learn by seeing her naked. Leonatus comes to the conclusion that Iachimo and Imogen have been lovers, but in reality the villain discovered this by hiding in a trunk in Imogen’s room and emerging while she is sleeping. This scene is heavily inspired by a similar incident in the Decameron, a 14th-century Italian work by Boccaccio.
Cymbeline’s structure is very complex, with several different storylines relating to cross-dressing and mistaken identity. It also incorporates elements unusual in Shakespeare’s work, including a dream sequence in which the god Jupiter descends to earth riding an eagle. Many scholars have suggested that Shakespeare was experimenting with new elements which were becoming more common in Jacobean drama. This experimentation would bear fruit in his next and last plays, The Winter’s Tale and The Tempest.
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