Abstract
This contribution examines the Libro delle donne illustri by Giuseppe Betussi (1545). This is the Italian translation of Boccaccio’s De mulieribus claris, supplemented by an additione, which contains fifty biographies of women who lived mainly after Boccaccio’s time. My essay analyses this work both as part of the history of the reception of Boccaccio’s De mulieribus, and in the context of the 16th-century literature on famous women. An in-depth analysis of the additione allows us to highlight the different conceptions of the biographical genre; for Betussi, it must include a value of exemplarity and he develops this genre towards a praise of feminine virtue.
Bartuschat, Johannes