Tansillio, Luigi (1510–1568)

Italian courtier, soldier, and poet, born in Venosa in southern Italy. He served in administrative and military posts under the Spanish viceroys of Naples, taking an active part in many campaigns. As a poet he wrote in a wide range of forms, from sonnets and eclogues in the style of Petrarch, to didactic verse and religious epics. One of his early works, Il vendemmiatore/The Grape Harvester (1532), was put on the Index Librorum Prohibitorum for obscenity.

His other works include numerous lyrics, which achieved wide circulation; the religious epic Le lagrime de S Pietro/The Tears of St Peter (1585); and La balia/The Nurse, written to encourage mothers to nurse their own babies.