Set on the Island of Cyprus in ancient times the opera's convoluted plot, full of disguises and mistaken identities, revolves around the amorous misadventures of Selino who has been pursued to Salamis by his deserted wife Princess Argia.

The following evening L'Argia was performed at the Archduke's new theatre which had been inaugurated the previous year and stood on the site of today's Tiroler Landestheater.

He later wrote: That night she [Queen Christina] was entertayned with a most excellent opera, all in musick, and in Italian, the actors of that play being all of that nation, and, as some of themselves told me, they were seven castrati or eunuchs; the rest were whoores, monks, fryers, and priests.

There are copies of the libretto printed for public performances in Naples (1667), Venice (1669), Milan (1669), Siena (1669) Viterbo (1670 and 1680), Reggio (1671), Verona (1671), Udine (1673), and Pisa (1674).

[9] The opera's first performance in modern times was on 18 August 1996 at the Tyrolean State Theatre during the Innsbruck Festival of Early Music directed by Jean-Louis Martinoty with Laura Polverelli in the title role.

Jacobs subsequently took the Innsbruck production and cast to Opéra de Lausanne in Switzerland in 1997 and the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées in Paris in 1999 (the opera's first performance in France).

On a visit to the Island of Negroponte where he had been sent to learn foreign customs and languages, Selino had seduced Princess Argia, married her, and then abandoned her when she became pregnant.

In his subsequent wanderings Selino arrives in Salamis and promptly falls in love with King Atamante's daughter Dorisbe, not realising that she is actually his sister.

After recovering from childbirth, Argia, determined to track down her errant husband, leaves her baby son in the care of the old shepherd Osman.

Unbeknownst to her, Osman had been the slave at Atamante's Court charged with taking care of Lucimoro/Selino and had fled to Negroponte when he was blamed for the child's kidnapping.