The Thracian Wonder is a stage play of English Renaissance drama, a work that constitutes a long-standing and persistent problem for scholars and historians of the subject.
The Thracian Wonder enters the historical record with its initial 1661 publication, in a quarto printed by Thomas Johnson for the bookseller Francis Kirkman – the only edition of the play in the seventeenth century.
The quarto's title page states that the drama "hath been several times acted with great applause," though no hard evidence of the play's date of origin or early productions has survived.
More broadly, The Thracian Wonder reveals debts to the works of Edmund Spenser and John Lyly,[2] and can be classed with plays that show the influence of Sidneyan pastoral, like Shirley's The Arcadia.
Radagon, the infant's father, bursts in upon the scene to protect Ariadne; but he is the son of the king of Sicily, an enemy of Thrace, and his presence only incenses Pheander more.
Act I closes with a dumbshow, which shows a storm-tossed Ariadne and Ragadon separately rescued by shepherds; a Chorus and a personified Time comment on the action.
(This inability of characters to recognise their friends and loved ones in changed circumstances can strike modern readers as absurd and imbecilic; but it is a recurring element in the popular literature and drama of the era.
The shepherds rise up in rebellion to rescue their "queen" – but then join forces with Pheander when the armies of Sicily and Africa arrive.
The conflict eventually boils down to a single combat between Radagon and Eusanius; but before they can kill each other, their true identities are revealed, and the differences among the principals are resolved.
Palemon and Serena are happily united at the play's end, as are Radagon and Ariadne, and Eusanius and Lillia Guida; peace and amity are restored.