Teresa, Contessa Guiccioli (1800–1873) was an Italian noblewoman and the married lover[2] of Lord Byron while he was living in Ravenna and writing the first five cantos of Don Juan.

[5] Byron's relationship with Teresa was a dangerous one as Count Guiccioli was still a powerful man who was widely believed to have been behind the murder in 1816 of another nobleman who was suing him for having seized his lands under Napoleon.

[7] In a letter, Byron wrote that she mailed him some of her pubic hair, which was a traditional Italian gesture that indicated her willingness to begin an affair.

In 1823, the Austrian authorities allowed Count Gamba to leave his exile in the Romagna with the condition that the Countess Guiccioli had to end her relationship with Byron and return to her husband.

[11] When Byron boarded the Hercules, the ship that was to take him from Genoa to Greece, it caused "passionate grief" from Guiccioli who broke down in tears as she said farewell to her lover.