Dante Alighieri was a Florentine poet, philosopher, writer, and politician of the late thirteenth and early fourteenth centuries, whose work ranged across multiple forms and disciplines.

Born in Florence in 1265, Dante held citizenship of the Republic of Florence and was active as a politician alongside his literary and intellectual pursuits. He wrote in both Latin and Italian, and was associated with the Dolce Stil Novo, a poetic movement of his era. Among his works, Vita Nuova and Le Rime represent notable contributions, while Convivio and De vulgari eloquentia further demonstrate the breadth of his output as a prose writer and linguist.

His political thought found expression in De Monarchia, and his range extended to include Epistles, Eclogues, the Questio de situ et formae aque et terre, and L'oracion che fe Danti a la morte. The Divine Comedy stands as his most substantial and widely noted work, drawing together his capacities as poet, philosopher, and political theorist. Across this body of writing, he worked in both Latin and Italian, engaging with questions that placed him among the intellectuals of his time.

Dante died in 1321, with some sources placing his death on the twenty-first or twenty-second of September of that year. His output, spanning poetry, prose, political theory, and epistolary writing, reflects the range of roles he occupied: poet, philosopher, politician, and linguist.