Editing Dido (section)

==Early accounts==
[[Image:Meister des Vergilius Vaticanus 001.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Aeneid, Book IV, Death of Dido. From the [[Vergilius Vaticanus]] (Vatican Library, Cod. Vat. lat. 3225).]]

The person of Dido can be traced to references by Roman historians to [[lost writings]] of Timaeus of Tauromenium in Sicily (c.&nbsp;356–260 BC).

Ancient historians gave various dates, both for the foundation of Carthage and the foundation of Rome. [[Appian]], in the beginning of his ''Punic Wars'', claims that Carthage was founded by a certain Zorus and Carchedon, but ''Zorus'' looks like an alternative transliteration of the city name ''Tyre,'' while ''Carchedon'' is just the Greek form of ''Carthage''. Timaeus made Carchedon's wife Elissa the sister of King [[Pygmalion of Tyre]]. Archaeological evidence of settlement on the site of Carthage before the last quarter of the 8th century BC has yet to be found. 
That the city is named {{script|Phnx|𐤒𐤓𐤕 𐤇𐤃𐤔𐤕}} (''Qart-hadasht'', or "New City") at least indicates it was a colony.

The only surviving full account before Virgil's treatment is that of Virgil's contemporary [[Gnaeus Pompeius Trogus]] in his ''Philippic histories'' as rendered in a digest or epitome made by [[Junianus Justinus]] in the 3rd century AD.

[[Justin (historian)|Justin]], quoting or paraphrasing Trogus, states (18.4–6) that a king of [[Tyre (Lebanon)|Tyre]], whom Justin does not name, made his very beautiful daughter Dido and son Pygmalion his joint heirs. But on his death, the people took Pygmalion alone as their ruler, though Pygmalion was yet still a boy. Dido married [[Acerbas]] her uncle, who, as priest of [[Heracles]]—that is, [[Melqart]]—was second in power to King Pygmalion. 
Rumor told that Acerbas had much wealth secretly buried, and King Pygmalion had Acerbas murdered in hopes of gaining this wealth. Dido, desiring to escape Tyre, expressed a wish to move into Pygmalion's palace, but she then ordered the attendants whom Pygmalion sent to aid in the move, to throw all Acerbas' bags of gold into the sea, apparently as an offering to his spirit. In fact, these bags contained only sand. Dido then persuaded the attendants to join her in flight to another land rather than face Pygmalion's anger when he discovered what had supposedly become of Acerbas' wealth. Some senators also joined her in her flight.

The party arrived at [[Cyprus]], where the priest of [[Jupiter (god)|Jupiter]] joined the expedition. There, the exiles also seized about eighty young women working as prostitutes on the shore, in order to provide wives for the men in the party.

Eventually Dido and her followers arrived on the coast of North Africa, where Dido asked the king [[Iarbas]]<ref>{{cite web|author=Temehu.com |url=http://www.temehu.com/History-of-Libya.htm |title=Ancient History and Prehistory of Libya and the Sahara, from 55 million BC. to the present, early history of Libya |publisher=Temehu.com |access-date=2014-01-09}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=zxKS7-ABAWMC&q=larbas+son+of+Jupiter&pg=PA879|title=Aufstieg und Niedergang der römischen Welt: Geschichte und Kultur Roms im Spiegel der Neueren Forschung|first=Walter|last=de Gruyter|date=February 1981|publisher=De Gruyter |isbn=9783110082883}}</ref> for a small bit of land for a temporary refuge until she could continue her journeying, only as much land as could be encompassed by an oxhide. They agreed. Dido cut the oxhide into fine strips so that she had enough to encircle an entire nearby hill, which was therefore afterwards named ''Byrsa'' ("hide"). That would become their new home. Many of the locals joined the settlement, and both they and envoys from the nearby [[Phoenicia]]n city of [[Utica, Tunisia|Utica]] urged the building of a city. In digging the foundations, an ox's head was found, indicating a city that would be wealthy but subject to others. In response to this portent, another area of the hill was dug instead, where a horse's head was found, indicating that the city would be powerful in war.

But when the new city of Carthage had been established and become prosperous, Iarbas, a native king of the Maxitani or Mauritani (manuscripts differ), demanded Dido for his wife or he would make war on Carthage. Still, she preferred to stay faithful to her first husband, and after creating a ceremonial funeral [[pyre]] and sacrificing many victims to his spirit in pretense that this was a final honoring of her first husband in preparation for marriage to Iarbas, Dido ascended the pyre, announced that she would go to her husband as they desired, and then slew herself with her sword. After this self-sacrifice, Dido was deified and was worshipped as long as Carthage endured.<ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.britannica.com/topic/Dido|title=Dido {{!}} Classical mythology|work=Encyclopedia Britannica|access-date=2017-08-04}}</ref> In this account, the foundation of Carthage occurred 72 years before the foundation of Rome.

[[Maurus Servius Honoratus|Servius]] in his commentary on Virgil's ''[[Aeneid]]'' gives ''Sicharbas'' as the name of Dido's husband in early tradition.