Dallapiccola sets three texts of imprisonment: a prayer of Mary Stuart, an extract from Book Three of Boethius' Consolation of Philosophy and Savonarola's unfinished Meditation on the Psalm 'My hope is in Thee, O Lord' .
Some of the musical material is based on Dallapiccola's earlier choral work on a similar theme, Canti di prigionia (1938).