Villena, Enrique de (1384-1434)

Spanish translator, astrologer, and cook. He was friends with Iñigo Santillana and his colourful life would be dramatized by Lope de Vega. On Santillana's request, he produced the first complete Castilian translation of Virgil's Aeneid and in 1428 translated Dante's Divine Comedy. He also composed an Arte cisoria o tratado del arte de cortar con el cuchillo/The Art of Cutting with a Knife (1423), on culinary matters.

He rose to become the Master of the Order of Calatrava, but even this supremely orthodox position could not save his library, most of which was burned on his death because of his reputation as a magician.