Boscan (Boscan Almogaver), Jnan, a Spanish poet, born in Barcelona before 1500, died in Perpignan about 1543. A patrician by birth, he was received at the court of Charles V. in Granada, served in the army, superintended for some time the education of the famous duke of Alva, travelled extensively, was converted to Italian forms of versification by Andrea Nava-gero, ambassador of Venice in Spain, and became the founder of a new Spanish school of poetry, which has prevailed ever since. He wrote Leandro (1540), a long tale in blank verse after the model of Bernardo Tasso, on the basis of the " Hero and Leander" of Musasus. In the same year he translated Cas-tiglione's " Courtier," which acquired celebrity as the most classical Spanish prose work of those days. His complete works were published by his widow in 1543, and consist of four books, the first containing poems of the old Castilian school, the second and third his poetry after Petrarch and other Italian models, and the fourth, " The Allegory," being the most original and celebrated of all.

Among his works are poetical epistles after the manner of Horace, pastorals, and eclogues.