HEKTOROVIC, PETAR

born 1487, Starigrad, Hvar Island, Dalmatia, Republic of Venice died March 13, 1572, Starigrad folk poet and collector of Dalmatian songs, an important figure in the Ragusan (Dubrovnik) Renaissance in South Slavic literature. An aristocratic landowner educated in Italy and influenced by the Venetian background of his native island, Hektorovic was impressed by the Italian Humanist adaptation of classical forms for vernacular literature. Although he wrote Italian and Latin verse and translated Ovid, popular Dalmatian lyrics intersperse his chief work, Ribanje i ribarsko prigovaranje (1555; "Fishing and Fishermen's Talk"), a pastoral and philosophic poem.