1539 in literature

This article contains information about the literary events and publications of 1539.

Events

April – Printing of the Great Bible is completed; it is distributed to churches in England. Prepared by Myles Coverdale, it contains much material from the Tyndale Bible – unacknowledged as the Tyndale version is officially deemed heretical.
Unknown dates
*Game Place House in Great Yarmouth becomes the first place in England to be used regularly as a public theatre.
*Marie Dentière writes an open letter to Marguerite of Navarre, sister of King Francis I of France. This Epistre tres utile calls for an expulsion of Catholic clergy from France.
*The first printing press in North America is set up in Mexico City. The first known book from it, Manual de Adultos, appears in 1540.
*Teseo Ambrogio's Introductio in Chaldaicam lingua, Syriaca atq Armenica, & dece alias linguas, published in Pavia, introduces several Middle Eastern languages to Western Europe for the first time.

February 27 – Franciscus Raphelengius, Flemish-born Dutch scholar, printer and bookseller
March 5 – Christoph Pezel, German theologian
April 12 – Garcilaso de la Vega, Spanish Peruvian mestizo chronicler
December 5 – Fausto Paolo Sozzini, Italian theologian
December 20 – Paulus Melissus, German writer in Latin, translator and composer
Unknown dates
*Olivier de Serres, French writer on agriculture and horticulture
*Jean de Tournes, French author, printer and bookseller
*Richard White of Basingstoke, English jurist and historian

March 5 – Kaspar Ursinus Velius, German scholar, poet and historian
May 7 – Ottaviano Petrucci, Italian printer
July 5 – Anthony Maria Zaccaria, Italian religious writer, leader of the Counter-reformation and saint
July 12 – Ferdinand Columbus, Spanish bibliographer and cosmographer
August 10 – Lanspergius, German Carthusian monk and ascetic writer
November 25 – Johann Alexander Brassicanus, German author and teacher
Unknown date – Gabriel Alonso de Herrera, Spanish author of an agricultural treatise