BERNI, FRANCESCO (c. Italian poet, was born at Lamporecchio, in Bibbiena, a district lying along the Upper Arno. In his 1 gth year he went to Rome, trusting to obtain some assistance from his uncle, the Cardinal Bibbiena, but he was obliged to accept a situation as clerk to Ghiberti, datary to Clement VII. The duties of his office were exceedingly irksome to the poet, but he made himself celebrated at Rome as the most witty and inventive member of a club of literary men, who devoted themselves to light and sparkling effusions. So strong was the admiration for Berni's verses that mocking or burlesque poems have since been called poesie bernesca. About the year 153o he was relieved from his servitude by obtaining a canonry in the cathedral of Florence. In that city he died in 1536, accord ing to tradition poisoned by Duke Alessandro de' Medici for having refused to poison the duke's cousin, Ippolito de' Medici; but considerable obscurity rests over this story. Berni stands at the head of Italian comic or burlesque poets, but perhaps he owes his greatest fame to the recasting (Ri f acimento) of Boiardo's Orlando Innaniorato, a task which he completed with such success that general opinion has pronounced decisively in favour of the revision over the original. To each canto he prefixed a few stanzas of reflective verse in the manner of Ariosto, and in ome of these introductions he gives us the only certain information we have concerning his own life. The first edition of the Rif aci mento was printed posthumously in 1541 and a partial translation into English verse was published by W. S. Rose (1823) .