Aretino, Pietro

Italian author born in Arezzo, Tuscany to a poor cobbler. He had little or no schooling, but he was clever and astute, and he soon understood the power of words. In the beginning, these talents were generally a nuisance to others. When he was fourteen, he was expelled from school as punishment for having written an insulting sonnet. He did not dare to return home for fear that his father would apply his leather on him. Instead, he embarked on an arduous walking tour that lasted for many years and ended in Rome where he was employed by a wealthy banker, Agostino Chigi, before he went into service at the court of Pope Leo X and later Clement VII.