Hyacinthe Maglanowich

Fictitious Slavic composer and gusle player (a sort of one-stringed bowed banjo), invented by French dramatist Prosper Mérimée (1803-1870) as the author of his 1827 work La Guzla, ou, Choix de poésies Illyriques, recueillies dans la Dalmatie, la Bosnie, la Croatie et l'Herzegowine (The Gusle, or, Choice of Illyric Poems, collected in Dalmatia, Bosnia, Croatia and Herzegovina), supposedly a collection and translation of authentic Illyrian (Croatian) poems and ballads.

Mérimée helpfully included an introductory bio of Maglanowich and an engraving of him as the frontispiece! When real poet Pushkin started translating some of the poems into Russian, Mérimée felt he had to fess up to the hoax.

External Links

• La Guzla at Archive.org