Anonymously submitted, an acrostic of the first letter of each chapter in Italian reveals its probable author, a Dominican Monk.
The protagonist of Umberto Eco's The Mysterious Flame of Queen Loana did his doctoral thesis on this work, and though an English translation was begun 1592, it was abandoned. Finally translated 500 years after its original publication by musicologist Jocelyn Godwin in 1999, she retained the format set by the orignial publisher, Aldus Manutius. Anonymously submitted, an acrostic of the first letter of each chapter in Italian reveals its probable author, a Dominican Monk. Its 174 accompanying woodcuts help to tell of  a troubled "lover of many things," who goes on his Hypnotic quest for, "many things." FTP name this romance about Poliphilo's quest for Polia, attributed to Francesco Colonna a classic of Renaissance incunabula.
The protagonist of Umberto Eco's The Mysterious Flame of Queen Loana did his doctoral thesis on this work, and though an English translation was begun 1592, it was abandoned.
{Hypnerotomachia Poliphili} or The {Strife of Love in a Dream} (acc.