In 884 or 885, the Armenian nobles coronated Ashot Bagratuni. The newly established Bagratid Kingdom needed to have its capital city. Despite the fact that the capital city of the Arsacids, Dvin, was one of the biggest cities of Armenia, it was always under the threat of attacks by Atropatene. The Bagratids chose impregnable Bagaran on the right bank of the Akhuryan river as the capital city.
The libretto of this operetta was written by the Austrian playwright Leo Stein and librettist Bela Jenbach. Kalman conceived the idea of creating an operetta dedicated to the variety star Sylva Varescu in the beginning of 1914. The German libretto was called "Long live love."
The operetta was completed by November 1915, and its premiere took place on November 17 at the Johann Strauss Theater in Vienna.
The first staging of the operetta in Russia was in the midst of the World War I (1916), so both the title of the operetta and many of the names of the characters were changed. Since then, the Soviet and Russian audience have known this operetta as "Silva."
