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Pharsalus

(Encyclopedia)Pharsalus färˈsäləs [key], ancient city, Thessaly, Greece. Near there in 48 b.c., Julius Caesar decisively defeated Pompey, who had a much larger force. Lucan's Bellum Civile (often called Pharsal...

Camões, Luís de

(Encyclopedia)Camões or Camoens, Luís de both: lo͞oēshˈ dĭ kəmoiNshˈ [key], 1524?–1580, Portuguese poet, the greatest figure in Portuguese literature. Born of a poor family, Camões gained wide familiarit...

Tasso, Torquato

(Encyclopedia)Tasso, Torquato tōrkwäˈtō täsˈsō [key], 1544–95, Italian poet, one of the foremost writers and a tragic figure of the Renaissance. Educated in Naples by Jesuits, he later studied law and phil...

Joseph of Exeter

(Encyclopedia)Joseph of Exeter, fl. c.1190, English poet who wrote in Latin. He is best known for De Bello Trojano (c.1184), an epic poem in six books, written in the style of Vergil. His adventures in the Third Cr...

Gresset, Jean Baptiste Louis

(Encyclopedia)Gresset, Jean Baptiste Louis zhäN bätēstˈ lwē grĕsāˈ [key], 1709–77, French poet and dramatist. He was the author of a mock epic, Vairvert (1734), and of a successful comedy, Le Méchant (17...

Chapelain, Jean

(Encyclopedia)Chapelain, Jean zhäN shäplăNˈ [key], 1595–1674, French critic and poet. His works include La Pucelle (1656), an epic poem about Joan of Arc. Chapelain was a founding member of the French Academy...

Nonnus

(Encyclopedia)Nonnus nŏnˈəs [key], fl. 5th cent.?, Greek poet, b. Panopolis, Egypt. His extant epic, Dionysiaca (in 48 books), a collection of legends about Dionysus, has innovations in meter that predict the la...

Gallen-Kallela, Akseli Valdemar

(Encyclopedia)Gallen-Kallela, Akseli Valdemar äkˈsālē välˈdāmär gälānˈ-kälˈlālä [key], 1865–1931, Finnish painter. He was a student of Bouguereau. His series of stark, linear paintings of the Kalev...

Gama, Vasco da

(Encyclopedia)Gama, Vasco da văˈskō də găˈmə, Port. väshˈkō dä gäˈmə [key], c.1469–1524, Portuguese navigator, the first European to journey by sea to India. His epochal voyage (1497–99) was made ...

Cursor Mundi

(Encyclopedia)Cursor Mundi kûrˈsôr mŭnˈdī [key], a long religious epic in Middle English relating the history of the world as recorded in the Old and New Testaments. This anonymous poem (written c.1300) is a ...