Ercole Strozzi (

Ferrara Ferrara (; ; ) is a city and ''comune'' (municipality) in Emilia-Romagna, Northern Italy, capital of the province of Ferrara. it had 132,009 inhabitants. It is situated northeast of Bologna, on the Po di Volano, a branch channel of the main ...

, September 2, 1473 – Ferrara, June 6, 1508) was an Italian poet, the son of Tito Vespasiano Strozzi. He was a friend of

Lucrezia Borgia Lucrezia Borgia (18 April 1480 – 24 June 1519) was an Italian noblewoman of the House of Borgia who was the illegitimate daughter of Pope Alexander VI and Vannozza dei Cattanei. She was a former governor of Spoleto. Her family arranged ...

, to whom he dedicated the poem ''La caccia''. He married the poet Barbara Torelli and was murdered in Ferrara by an unknown assailant.

Murder

On the morning of 6 June 1508, the body of Ercole Strozzi was found on the road near the Church of San Francesco in Ferrara, at the corner of via Praisolo and via Savonarola, near the wall of casa Romei. The lack of blood at the scene indicated that he had been moved. He had been out riding his mule the day before when he was ambushed and stabbed 22 times. His brothers, Lorenzo and Guido Strozzi, beseeched Francesco Gonzaga to avenge the death, but the perpetrators were never discovered; his wife, Barabara, also sought Gonzaga's protection following this event. Ercole's daughter was only 13 days old at the time of the murder. Ercole also had another child by her and two other illegitimate children. Pope Julius II accused his inveterate enemy, the then Duke of Ferrara,

Alfonso I d'Este Alfonso d'Este (21 July 1476 – 31 October 1534) was Duke of Ferrara from 1504 to 1534, during the time of the War of the League of Cambrai. Biography He was the son of Ercole I d'Este, Duke of Ferrara and Eleanor of Naples and became du ...

, of playing a role in the murder of Ercole.Ariosto biography

References

1473 births 1508 deaths Italian poets Italian male poets Neo-Latin poets 15th-century writers in Latin Ercole Writers from Ferrara {{Italy-poet-stub