Il Xerse ( in its 1660 French version Xerxès) is an opera by Francesco Cavalli (specifically, a dramma per musica) about Xerxes I. The libretto was written by Nicolò Minato, and was later set by both Giovanni Bononcini (1694, Xerse and George Frideric Handel (Serse, 1738). Minato's plot outline is loosely based on Book 7 of Herodotus's Histories. The opera, Cavalli's twenty-first, consisting of a prologue and three acts, was first performed at Venice on 12 January 1655, at the Teatro SS. Giovanni e Paolo. It was dedicated to the Ferrarese nobleman Marchese Cornelio Bentivoglio.