In Greek mythology, Pyramus and Thisbe (Ancient Greek: Πύραμος καὶ Θίσβη, romanized: Púramos kaì Thísbē) were two lovers from Babylon. Their story is most famous from a poem called Metamorphoses by Ovid. Many writers have retold this sad tale over time.

Pyramus and Thisbe’s parents did not allow them to be together because of a disagreement. However, the lovers spoke to each other through a small crack in the wall between their homes. They planned to meet under a mulberry tree, but a series of sad mistakes led to their deaths. Thisbe ran away from a lion and left her cloak behind. Pyramus found the cloak and thought Thisbe had died from the lion’s attack. He killed himself, and his blood stained the mulberry fruits. When Thisbe found Pyramus dead, she also killed herself. The gods changed the color of the mulberry fruits to remember their forbidden love.

Ovid’s version is the oldest one that still exists, but the story may have come from earlier myths in Cilicia. The tale has been changed in many ways and has inspired works like Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet and A Midsummer Night’s Dream, as well as modern stories in books, operas, and popular culture. The story has also been shown in art, including ancient Roman mosaics and Renaissance paintings.

Mythology

Pyramus and Thisbe are two lovers who live in the city of Babylon. They live in houses that are connected by a wall. Their parents, who are enemies, do not allow them to marry. The two lovers speak to each other through a crack in the wall and plan to meet near a tomb under a mulberry tree. They share their feelings for one another there. Thisbe arrives first but sees a lioness with blood on its mouth from killing an animal. She runs away, leaving her cloak behind. When Pyramus arrives, he sees Thisbe’s torn cloak and blood on the ground. He believes a wild animal killed her and uses a sword to kill himself, a common way to die in Babylon. His blood stains the white mulberry leaves, turning them dark. Thisbe returns later and finds Pyramus’s body under the mulberry tree. She prays to her parents and the gods to let them be buried together. After a short time of mourning, she uses the same sword to kill herself. The gods hear her prayers and change the color of the mulberry fruits to honor their love. Their ashes are placed in one urn, as Thisbe wished. Pyramus and Thisbe are examples of love that lasts until the end.

Ovid’s version of the story, written in 8 AD, is the oldest known version. However, he changed an older myth about the origins of things. In Ovid’s story, Pyramus and Thisbe live in Babylon. Earlier, a writer named Ctesias placed the tomb of a king named Ninus near Babylon. The myth likely began in Cilicia, a region in the empire of Ninus. The name Pyramus is similar to the Greek name for the Ceyhan River. In the older version of the story, Pyramus becomes the river, and Thisbe becomes a nearby spring. A mosaic found in Nea Paphos, Cyprus, from the 2nd century shows this older version. This version also appears in a work called the progymnasmata, written by Nicolaus Sophista, a Greek teacher and speaker who lived in the 5th century AD.

Ovid’s story was influenced by earlier Greek tales about tragic love. These stories often involve a man accidentally causing a woman’s death, after which he dies or kills himself out of sorrow. Examples include the stories of Anthippe and Cichyrus, and Cyanippus and Leucone.

Adaptations

The story of Pyramus and Thisbe appears in Giovanni Boccaccio's On Famous Women as biography number twelve (sometimes thirteen) and in his Decameron, in the fifth story on the seventh day. In this version, a woman who is married lives next to a man she loves and communicates with him through a crack in the wall. She drops small pieces of stone and straw through the crack to catch his attention.

In the 1380s, Geoffrey Chaucer included the story in his Legend of Good Women, and John Gower included it in his Confessio Amantis. Gower changed the story to teach a lesson about the dangers of love. John Metham's Amoryus and Cleopes (1449) is another early version of the story in English.

The tragedy of Romeo and Juliet was inspired by Ovid's version of the story. In this tale, Romeo and Juliet cannot be together because Juliet is promised to another man by her family, and their families have a long-standing feud. Like Pyramus and Thisbe, the lovers mistakenly believe the other has died, leading to their deaths. The first version of Romeo and Juliet was published in 1476 by Masuccio Salernitano. It later took its current form when Luigi da Porto wrote it in 1524. Both Salernitano and da Porto are believed to have been influenced by Ovid and Boccaccio. Shakespeare's famous version from the 1590s was based on Arthur Brooke's 1562 poem The Tragical History of Romeus and Juliet, which was itself a translation of a French version of da Porto's story.

In Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream (Act V, Scene 1), a comedy from the 1590s, a group of actors called "mechanicals" perform a version of Pyramus and Thisbe. Their performance is clumsy and poorly done, except for the final speeches by Nick Bottom (as Pyramus) and Francis Flute (as Thisbe). The theme of forbidden love also appears in the main story of A Midsummer Night's Dream, where a girl named Hermia cannot marry the man she loves, Lysander, because her father, Egeus, wants her to marry another man named Demetrius.

The Beatles performed a humorous version of Pyramus and Thisbe on the 1964 television show Around the Beatles. Based on Shakespeare's adaptation, the performance included Paul McCartney as Pyramus, John Lennon as Thisbe, George Harrison as Moonshine, and Ringo Starr as Lion, with Trevor Peacock as Quince.

Spanish poet Luis de Góngora wrote a poem titled Fábula de Píramo y Tisbe in 1618. French poet Théophile de Viau wrote a tragedy called Les amours tragiques de Pyrame et Thisbée in 1621.

In 1718, Giuseppe Antonio Brescianello composed an opera called La Tisbe for a court in Württemberg. François Francoeur and François Rebel created Pirame et Thisbé, a five-act opera with a prologue, for the Académie royale de musique in 1726. John Frederick Lampe adapted the story as a "Mock Opera" in 1745, featuring a character named "Wall" who sang. In 1768, Johann Adolph Hasse composed a serious opera titled Piramo e Tisbe in Vienna.

Edmond Rostand changed the story in his play Les Romanesques, where the parents of the lovers pretend to oppose their love to bring them together. A musical version of this story, The Fantasticks, became the longest-running musical in the world when it was adapted in 1960.

In The Simpsons 2012 episode "The Daughter Also Rises," Nick and Lisa's love story is compared to Pyramus and Thisbe. Like the lovers in the myth, Nick and Lisa meet through a crack between two booths in a restaurant. Later in the episode, they are shown at the tree where Pyramus and Thisbe met their fate.

In 2020, Bolu Babalola included a version of Pyramus and Thisbe in her book Love in Color: Mythical Tales from Around the World, Retold. In this version, Pyramus and Thisbe are college students who live next to each other in a dorm with a crack in the wall. Unlike the original story, they end up together happily.

In art

• Roman mosaic located in Paphos, Cyprus
• Painting created by Jasper van der Laanen (1585–1634)
• 16th century artwork from the Unterlinden Museum in Colmar
• Artwork by Nicolaus Knüpfer from the early 17th century
• Artwork by Nicholas Poussin from 1651
• Artwork by Andreas Nesselthaler from 1795
• Artwork by Pierre Gautherot from 1799
• Thisbe, created by John William Waterhouse in 1909.

General references

• Ovid's book called Metamorphoses, specifically part IV, lines 55 to 166.

• Thomas Bulfinch wrote a book titled The Age of Fable; Or, Stories of Gods and Heroes. It was published in 1856 by Sanborn, Carter, and Bazin. This was the second edition of the book.