Adimari, Alexander

, an Italian poet, a descendant from the ancient family of Adimari, at Florence; was born in 1579. Between 1637 and 1640 he published six collections of fifty sonnets each, under the names of six of the muses: Terpsichore, Clio, Melpomene, Calliope, Urania, and Polyhymnia, which partake of the bad taste of his age, in forced sentiments and imagery; but he was an accomplished scholar in the Greek and Latin languages. His translation of Pindar, “Ode di Pindaro, tradotte da Alessandro Adimari,” Pisa, 1631, 4to, is principally valued for the notes, as the author has been very unfortunate in transfusing the spirit of the original. In the synopsis, he appears indebted to the Latin translation of Erasmus Schmidt. Of his private history we only know that he lived poor and unhappy, and died in 1649. ²