Maria Maddalena Morelli

Maria Maddalena Morelli
Portrait printed in Sarah Josepha Hale's Woman's Record (1853)
Portrait printed in Sarah Josepha Hale's Woman's Record (1853)
Born17 March 1727
Pistoia
Died8 November 1800(1800-11-08) (aged 73)
Florence
Pen nameCorilla Olimpica
Notable awards Laurea poetica (1776)

Maria Maddalena Morelli Fernandez (17 March 1727, Pistoia – 8 November 1800, Florence), also known by the Arcadian pseudonym Corilla Olimpica, was a Florentine Italian poet, improvisatrice, and musician. The official poetess to the grand ducal court in Florence (1765–1775), she won fame as the foremost female performer of the improvised poetry then popular in Italy, and was controversially crowned with the laurel wreath on the Roman Capitol in 1776, an event later fictionalised by Madame de Staël in Corinne, or Italy.[1]

References

  1. ^ Hainsworth, Peter; Robey, David, eds. (2002). The Oxford Companion to Italian Literature. Oxford University Press. ISBN 9780198183327.

Further reading