Joanot Martorell
Joanot Martorell (1413–1468) was a Valencian knight whose life was marked by chivalric ideals and court intrigue.
Writing in the Valencian vernacular, which he called vulgar llengua valenciana, he crafted Tirant lo Blanch, a sweeping tale of knightly adventure set in the Byzantine Empire.
Martorell died before completing the novel, and his colleague Martí Joan de Galba finished it, publishing the work posthumously in Valencia in 1490.
The novel is celebrated as one of the earliest works of alternative history and was famously praised by Cervantes' fictional priest in Don Quixote as the finest chivalric novel ever written.
