During the period of exoticism, far-off locations and ostensibly foreign musical elements were also all the rage in 19th-century opera. In 1863, Georges Bizet was commissioned by the director of the Théâtre Lyrique in Paris to compose a work of this kind: it was the first major opera that Bizet was able to present. The three-way love story, written by the experienced librettists Cormon and Carré, featured exotic rituals and attractive natives in whom the same tempestuous emotions raged as in works set in the Old World.

The pearl fishers await the consecrated virgin, who is to calm the sea with her prayers so that the fishers can go about their work in safety. Zurga, their new leader, and his friend, the hunter Nadir, once fell in love with the same girl, but swore not to pursue her for the sake of their friendship. But Nadir has secretly broken the oath and pproached her. When the veiled virgin appears she has to swear never to belong to a man. But when he hears her voice, Nadir immediately recognizes her as the girl he loves, Leila. At night the two lovers meet, but are discovered by Nourabad, the High Priest. Zurga is obliged to sentence the two of them to death. At first, he wants to show mercy to his friend and the virgin and pardon them, but when Nourabad tears the veil from the virgin’s face and Zurga is confronted with Nadir’s treachery he condemns them to death in a fit of jealous fury. However, he quickly regrets his impulsiveness, especially when Leila, who begs him to spare Nadir’s life, reveals that she once saved his, Zurga’s, life. When the two lovers are being led away to be executed, Zurga starts a fire in the fishers’ camp so that Nadir and Leila can escape in the ensuing chaos.