Tinctoris, Johannes (c. 1435–c. 1511)

Franco-Flemish music theorist and composer. He wrote a number of important theoretical works and composed Masses, motets, and chansons. His dictionary of musical terms, Terminorum Musicae Diffinitorium (1495), was the first of its kind and defines 299 musical terms.

He was born at Nivelles, and studied both law and theology. He was ordained, and became a canon of Poperinghe. He may have been a singer at Cambrai in 1460, under Guillaume Dufay, and in 1463 was choirmaster at Orléans Cathedral. He went to Italy and from about 1472 was in the service of Ferdinand of Aragon, King of Naples, maintaining connections with the court there for at least the next 15 years. He founded a school of music and was in the papal chapel at Rome 1484–1500.

Tinctoris is remembered as one of the most important music theorists of his day; he wrote 12 treatises, two of which were printed. His other writings deal with composition, improvisation, the aesthetics of music, and its role in education and religion.