Giovan Maria Cecchi (1517a1587) was the most prolific and popular of sixteenth-century Florentine daramatists. His best-known play, L'Assiuolo ( The Horned Owl ), brings to the stage the amorous adventure of two students at the university of Pisa who fall in love with the same married lady. Through a servant's ruse they both succeed in gratifying their senses and in establishing a love affair that will see them through their undergraduate career.