Francesco Petrarca (1304-1374)

Francesco Petrarca, commonly anglicized as Petrarch, was an Italian scholar and poet, often credited with initiating the 14th-century Italian Renaissance and founding Renaissance humanism, as well as developing the concept of the Dark Ages. His sonnets were admired and imitated throughout Europe during the Renaissance and became a model for lyrical poetry. Petrarch would be later endorsed as a model for Italian style by the Accademia della Crusca.