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Artist
Leonora d’Este
2+ albums
16th centuryitalianwomen composers
about
Eleonora d'Este (4 July 1515, Ferrara – 1575, Ferrara) was a Ferrarese noblewoman. She was the first daughter of Alfonso I d'Este, Duke of Ferrara and his second wife Lucrezia Borgia – as his first daughter, Alfonso named her after his mother Eleanor of Naples. She was brought up in Ferrara and her mother died when she was four – her father had two more children with Laura Dianti. Eleonora was the only one of Alfonso and Lucrezia's daughters to survive both their parents. She became a nun at the Corpus Domini Monastery and was buried there alongside her mother and other members of her family. In 1543, Girolamo Scotto of Venice published a collection of 43 religious motets under the title Musica quinque vocum motetta materna lingua vocata. There is no indication in that publication as to who the composer might have been. Laurie Stras, professor of music at Southampton University, has argued that Leonora may have been the composer. Leonora was triply disqualified from being named in those days: being a woman, and a princess, and a nun. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.