Francesco Colonna (1433/1434 – 1527) was an Italian
Dominican priest and
monk who was credited with the authorship of the ''
Hypnerotomachia Poliphili'' by an
acrostic
An acrostic is a poem or other word composition in which the ''first'' letter (or syllable, or word) of each new line (or paragraph, or other recurring feature in the text) spells out a word, message or the alphabet. The term comes from the Fre ...
formed by initial letters of the text.
He lived in
Venice
Venice ( ; it, Venezia ; vec, Venesia or ) is a city in northeastern Italy and the capital of the Veneto Regions of Italy, region. It is built on a group of 118 small islands that are separated by canals and linked by over 400 ...
, and preached at
St. Mark's Cathedral. Besides ''
Hypnerotomachia Poliphili'', he definitely wrote a
Latin epic poem, ''Delfili Somnium'' (the "Dream of Delfilo"), which went unpublished in his lifetime and was not published until 1959. Colonna spent part of his life in the
monastery of
San Giovanni e Paolo in Venice, but the monastery was apparently not of the strictest observance and Colonna was granted leave to live outside its walls.
In
Ian Caldwell
Ian Mackinnon Caldwell is an American novelist known for co-authoring the 2004 novel ''The Rule of Four''. His second book, ''The Fifth Gospel'', was published in 2015.
Personal life
Caldwell was born and raised in Fairfax County, Virginia duri ...
's and
Dustin Thomason's novel ''
The Rule of Four
:''This article relates to the 2004 novel. For the legal practice, see Rule of four''.
The Rule of Four is a novel written by the American authors Ian Caldwell and Dustin Thomason, and published in 2004. Caldwell, a Princeton University grad ...
'', the Roman noble of the same name, Francesco Colonna, is featured as the true author of the ''Hypnerotomachia Poliphili''.
[A comparable conclusion was reached in G. Goebel, "Le songe de Francesco Colonna, prince prenestin", ''Fifteenth Century Studies'', Stuttgart, 1983.]
References
External links
*
*
* Colonna, Francesco, ''Hypnerotomachia: The Strife of Love in a Dreame'', Translation by R.D., London, 1592. Facsimile ed., introd. by Lucy Gent, 1973, Scholars' Facsimiles & Reprints, .
''Hypnerotomachia Poliphili'' at
MIT Press
''Hypnerotomachia Poliphili'' at
Rare Book Room
{{DEFAULTSORT:Colonna, Francesco
Italian Renaissance writers
15th-century Venetian writers
1430s births
1527 deaths
Italian Dominicans
16th-century Venetian writers
16th-century male writers