Antonio Minturno

Who was Antonio Minturno?

Antonio Sebastiano Minturno was an Italian poet and critic, and Bishop of Ugento. His influential literary theories were largely Aristotelian. He was born at Minturno, then part of the Kingdom of Naples.

He wrote three collections of poems in Latin: Carmina, Poemata, and Poemata Tridentina. He intensely admired the sonnets of Petrarch. In Italian he wrote the critical work De Poeta, a lengthy dialogue which repeats the old idea of tragedy as a lesson to the audience on the transience of worldly things, and as a method of spiritual purgation. It is prescriptive in tone and assumes poetry to be essentially imitative. The functions of the tragedian are to delight, to teach and to move: delectare, docere, movere.

The dialogue Minturno, ovvero de la bellezza by Torquato Tasso is dedicated to him. He died at Crotone in 1574.