Part I: Duke Theseus returns from overthrowing Scythia with his new wife, Hippolyta, and her sister, Emilie. Outside Athens, he meets a band of weeping women and learns that the tyrant Creon has murdered their husbands and dishonors the dead by leaving them unburied. Incensed, Theseus quickly overthrows Creon and restores the Theban dead to the women for ceremonial burying. After the destruction of Creon’s forces, booty hunters find two young knights (Palamon and Arcite) who are not quite dead. Theseus decides against executing the knights and instead imprisons them with no hope of ransom.
One morning several years later, Palamon sees the beautiful Emilie wandering about in her garden and cries out in pain. Arcite peers from the tower window and, upon seeing the fair Emilie, proclaims his own love for her. Because both knights claim their love for Emilie, their friendship gives way to hostility. About this time, a friend to both Theseus and Arcite arrives in Athens and secures Arcite’s release on the condition that he never return to Athens. Both knights think the other luckier: Palamon, because he can still see the beautiful Emilie; Arcite, because he can raise an army and capture her.
