• Late 16th c.
• oil on canvas
• 73 cm x 61.5 cm

This portrait is believed to represent Cvijeta Zuzoric (around 1552 -1648), the famous lyric poetess and beauty who was born in Dubrovnik into a prominent merchant family. This well-educated woman invited numerous authors and artists to her house, which was home to a widely-known literary academy. Cvijeta Zuzoric, an exceptionally beautiful and intelligent woman, was said to have written excellent epigrams and gentle rhymes, which, however, have not survived. She is known only by reputation, since she was mentioned and celebrated in countless poems by Dominik Zlataric, Miho Bunic-Babulinov, Miho Monaldi, Boccabinco, Simonetti, Marin Battitera - her contemporaries, as well as later Croatian authors. It is interesting to note that she was also mentioned in the sonnets of the great Italian poet Torquato Tasso, who praised her virtues and beauty even though he had never met her. Her great friend Nikola V. Gucetic described her physical and spiritual beauty in his famous philosophical work on love.

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