It is the first opera for which Saint-Saëns wrote his own French libretto, which is based on the classic story of Helen of Troy and Paris from Greek mythology.

The opera then fell into obscurity until it was recorded for the first time in 2008 by the Belle Époque Chorus and Orchestra Victoria under conductor Guillaume Tourniaire.

[4] Critics such as Hugo Shirley have accused the work of being too sentimental, proposing that Saint-Saëns's deliberate desire to distance himself from the vogue of verismo opera and the dramatic sensibilities of Richard Wagner may have prevented him from any kind operatic psychoanalysis.

The result, according to Shirley, is that while Saint-Saëns had intended to create a serious portrait of Helen of Troy, the music made it "sound at times like a parody of nineteenth-century sentimentality".

[4] Paris, a Trojan prince, comes to Sparta to marry Helen, whom he had been promised by Venus after he had chosen her as the most beautiful of the goddesses, earning the wrath of Athena and Hera.