1503 in literature

• August 8 – King James IV of Scotland marries Margaret Tudor in Edinburgh. This is thought to be the occasion for which the Hours of James IV of Scotland was produced, probably in Ghent.{{Cite book |author1=Martin Gosman |author2=A. Alasdair A. MacDonald |author3=Alasdair James Macdonald |author4=Arie Johan Vanderjagt |title=Princes and Princely Culture: 1450-1650 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=6cqMgy6ZxlMC&pg=PA161 |date=1 October 2003 |publisher=BRILL |isbn=90-04-13572-3 |pages=161}}
• unknown dates
• The first English translation of Thomas à Kempis' The Imitation of Christ is published .{{Cite book |author1=Thomas (à Kempis) |author2=William C. Creasy |title=The Imitation of Christ by Thomas a Kempis: A New Reading of the 1441 Latin Autograph Manuscript |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=JI7AA0GAbUgC&pg=PR22 |year=2007 |publisher=Mercer University Press |isbn=978-0-88146-097-1 |pages=22–}}
• An edition of Euripides' Tragoediae is published.{{Cite book |author=British Museum. Dept. of Printed Books |title=Librorum Impressorum Qui in Museo Britannico Adservantur Catalogus |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=bXwZAQAAIAAJ&pg=PP310 |year=1816 |pages=310}}

• Niccolò Machiavelli
• A Description of the Manner in which Duke Valentino put Vitellozzo Vitelli, Oliverotto da Fermo, Lord Pagola and the Duke of Gravina to Death (Descrizione del modo tenuto dal Duca Valentino nello ammazzare Vitellozzo Vitelli, Oliverotto da Fermo, il Signor Pagolo e il duca di Gravina Orsini){{cite book|author=Niccolò Machiavelli|title=Le opere di Niccolò Machiavelli ...|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=5AUJAAAAQAAJ&pg=PR50|year=1873|publisher=Tipografia Cenniniana|pages=50–}}
• On the method of dealing with the Rebellious Peoples of Valdichiana (Del modo di trattare i popoli della Valdichiana ribellati)

{{main|1503 in poetry}}

• William Dunbar – The Thrissil and the Rois{{cite book|author=Jean Jules Jusserand|title=A Literary History of the English People ...|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=7LNLAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA511|year=1895|publisher=G. P. Putnam's sons|pages=511}}
• Jean Lemaire de Belges – La Plainte du Désiré{{cite book|title=North Carolina Studies in the Romance Languages and Literatures|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=S-5RAQAAIAAJ|year=1973|publisher=University of North Carolina|isbn=978-0-8078-9217-6|page=79}}
• "Robin Hood and the Potter" (ballad){{cite book|author=Nick Evangelista|title=The Encyclopedia of the Sword|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=TyJ8ebnS1HMC&pg=PA504|year=1995|publisher=Greenwood Publishing Group|isbn=978-0-313-27896-9|pages=504}}

• March 22 – Antonio Francesco Grazzini, Florentine author (died 1584)
• June 28 – Giovanni della Casa, Florentine Latin-language writer on etiquette and poet (died 1556)
• November 17 – Bronzino, born Agnolo di Cosimo, Florentine Mannerist painter and poet (died 1572)
• December 14 (or 21) – Nostradamus, French apothecary and astrologer (died 1566)
• December 20 – Cosimo Bartoli, Italian diplomat, mathematician, philologist, humanist and translator (died 1572)
• unknown dates
• Robert Estienne, French printer (died 1559)
• Diego Hurtado de Mendoza, Spanish poet, novelist, historian and diplomat, governor of Granada (died 1575).
• Thomas Wyatt, English lyric poet and diplomat (died 1542){{cite book|author=Rowland Freeman|title=Kentish poets, a series of writers, natives of or residents in Kent; with specimens of their compositions, and some account of their lives and writings, by R. Freeman|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=KA8HAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA1|year=1821|pages=1}}
• probable – Nicholas Bourbon, French court preceptor and poet (died 1550)

• February 14 – Annamacharya, Indian Hindu saint and Telugu poet (born 1408)
• April 26 – Johannes Tolhopff, German astrologist (born c.1450)
• September 17 – Iovianus Pontanus, Italian Latin-language humanist and poet (born 1426){{cite web|url=https://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/giovanni-pontano_(Dizionario-Biografico)|publisher=Treccani|title=Pontano, Giovanni|author=Claudio Finzi|website=Dizionario-Biografico|language=it|access-date=March 29, 2021}}
• unknown dates
• Johann Bämler, German printer, illuminator and bookseller (born 1430)
• probable – Antonio Bonfini, Italian-born humanist historian and poet (born 1434)

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