Helius Eobanus Hessus

[1] His family name is said to have been Koch; Eoban was the name of a local saint; Hessus indicates the land of his birth, Helius the fact that he was born on Sunday.

His teacher and travel guide was Ludwig Stippius (Christiani), confidant of Martin Luther, to whom Hessus dedicated his first idyl in 1509.

Through the influence of Camerarius and Melanchthon, he obtained a post at Nuremberg (1526), but, finding a regular life distasteful, he again went back to Erfurt (1533).

His most original poem was the Heroides in imitation of Ovid, consisting of letters from holy women, from the Virgin Mary down to Kunigunde, wife of the Emperor Henry II.

His poems on Nuremberg and other towns have been edited with commentaries and 16th-century illustrations by J. Neff and V. von Loga in M. Herrmann and S. Szarnatolski's Lateinische Literaturdenkmäler des XV.