Gambara, Veronica

, an Italian poetess, born in 1485, was the daughter of the count John Francis Gambara, and was married in 1509 to Giberto X. lord of Correggio, whom she survived many years. Her natural disposition, the course of her education, and, above all perhaps, the instructions and advice of Peter Bembus, led her in her youth to devote a part of her leisure to the cultivation of her poetical talents, which through all the vicissitudes of her future life, was her occasional amusement. In 1528 she went to reside at Bologna, with a brother who was governor of that city, where she established a kind of academy that vras frequented by many of the literati, who then resided at the Roman court. On her return to Correggio, she had the honour of receiving as her guest the emperor Charles V. She died in 1550. Her writings which had been dispersed in various collections of the time, were corrected and published by Zamboni in 1759, Brescia, 8vo, with a life of the authoress. They display a peculiar originality and vivacity, both in sentiment and language, which raise them far above those insipid effusions, which under the name of sonnets at that time inundated Italy. ³