is remembered as Modena's poet laureate. La secchia rapita La secchia rapita was written by Tassoni between 1614 and 1615 and first published in Paris in 1622. It was not to be published in Italy until Tassoni modified it slightly to accommodate the censorship of the Catholic Church. Tassoni paid for the first Italian edition, bearing his own name, in 1624 (the poem had been previously circulated under the pseudonym of Aldrovinci Melisone). The final edition was published in 1630. The poem is loosely based on a war originating from the battle of Zappolino fought between Modena and Bologna in 1325. Most of the events reported in the poem are completely fictitious, even incorporating in the war the battle of Fossalta which had been fought almost a hundred years before. The central episode, in which the Modenese steal a bucket from their rivals, is not reported by the main contemporary historians, however a bucket, purported to be that very trophy, has been on display, in the basement of the Torre della Ghirlandina, from the times of the battle to present. In the poem, the theft of the bucket results in the eruption of an extremely complicated war, where even the Olympian gods take part (this is in the tradition of classical poems such as Homer's Iliad) and is eventually resolved by the intervention of the Pope. The narration is dotted by references to situations and persons contemporary to the author, and with farcical appearances such as the "Conte di Culagna" (Count of Ass-land) probably the best known character of the book. In the third chapter of the poem, armies from all over the country arrive to take part in the war, and the Conte of Culagna makes his first appearance: (*)The feathers recall the peacock and its vanity, the horns are the traditional symbol of the cuckold. References External links Italian poets Italian male poets 1565 births 1635 deaths Writers from Modena Baroque writers