1508 in literature

• April 4 – John Lydgate's poem The Complaint of the Black Knight becomes the first book printed in Scotland, from the Chepman and Myllar Press in Edinburgh.{{cite web|title=Best April day in history|url=https://www.scotsman.com/lifestyle/best-april-day-in-history-1-1164736|website=Scotsman|accessdate=25 April 2018|language=en}}
• unknown date
• The earliest known printed edition of the chivalric romance Amadis de Gaula, as edited and expanded by Garci Rodríguez de Montalvo (died c. 1505), is published in Castilian at Zaragoza.{{cite book|first=David|last=Hook|title=The Arthur of the Iberians: The Arthurian Legends in the Spanish and Portuguese Worlds|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=BcAmDAAAQBAJ&pg=PT282|year=2015|publisher=University of Wales Press|isbn=978-1-78316-243-7|pages=282}}
• Elia Levita completes writing the Bovo-Bukh in Yiddish.
• Estimated date of Manuscript D of Leonardo da Vinci's treatise on painting.{{cite book|author=Leonardo (da Vinci)|title=Leonardo da Vinci on Painting|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=yUojU-T05zUC&pg=PA116|year=1965|publisher=University of California Press|pages=116}}

• Desiderius Erasmus – Adagiorum chiliades (2nd ed., Venice)
• Johannes Trithemius – De septem secundeis{{cite book|title=The Harp and the Constitution: Myths of Celtic and Gothic Origin|date=2015|publisher=BRILL|isbn=9789004306387|page=177|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=eXPsCgAAQBAJ&pg=PA177|language=en}}

• Ludovico Ariosto – La Cassaria{{cite book|author=Giuseppe Coluccia|title=L'esperienza teatrale di Ludovico Ariosto|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=XGD0b_yM9h4C&pg=PA22|year=2001|publisher=Manni Editori|isbn=978-88-8176-215-6|pages=22|language=it}}
• The World and the Child (possible date)

{{main|1508 in poetry}}

• William Dunbar
• The Flyting of Dunbar and Kennedy, and Other Poems
• The Goldyn Targe

• April 3 – Jean Daurat (or Dorat), French poet and scholar, member of La Pléiade (died 1588)
• April 23 – Georg Sabinus, German poet, diplomat and academic (died 1560){{cite book|author=Karl Friedrich Ledderhose|title=The life of Philip Melanchthon, tr. by G.F. Krotel|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ZzcBAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA325|year=1855|pages=325}}
• June 13 – Alessandro Piccolomini, Italian humanist philosopher, translator and playwright (died 1579){{cite book|author=Sir Samuel Egerton Brydges|title=Res literariæ: bibliographical and critical, for Oct. 1820|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=yJAIAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA147|year=1822|pages=147}}
• December 21 – Thomas Naogeorgus, German Protestant reformer and Latin-language playwright (died 1563){{cite book|author=Union académique internationale|title=Catalogus Translationum Et Commentariorum, Volume 9|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=dsiKf4ZfKaUC&pg=PA40|year=1960|publisher=CUA Press|isbn=978-0-8132-1729-1|pages=40}}
• Unknown dates
• Marin Držić, Croatian dramatist, author and poet (died 1567)
• Isabel de Josa, Catalan writer (died 1575){{cite book|author1=Anne J. Cruz|author2=Rosilie Hernández|title=Women's Literacy in Early Modern Spain and the New World|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=FgNJKd1OdBcC&pg=PA72|year=2011|publisher=Ashgate Publishing, Ltd.|isbn=978-1-4094-2714-8|pages=72}}
• Primož Trubar, Slovene Protestant reformer, pioneer of Slovenian written language (died 1586)

• February 4 – Conrad Celtes, German and Latin-language poet (born 1459){{cite book|author=Christoph Reske|title=Die Produktion der Schedelschen Weltchronik in Nürnberg|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=SK_bsN3X7scC&pg=PA165|year=2000|publisher=Otto Harrassowitz Verlag|isbn=978-3-447-04296-3|pages=165}}
• May 13 – Martial d'Auvergne, French poet (born 1420){{cite book|author=English cyclopaedia|title=The English Cyclopædia|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=4v4GAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA129|year=1872|pages=129}}
• June 6 – Ercole Strozzi, Italian poet, murdered (born 1471){{cite book|author=Hugh James Rose|title=A New General Biographical Dictionary|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=o3HauIguws0C&pg=PA138|year=1857|publisher=T. Fellowes|pages=138}}
• August 27 – Hieronymus Münzer, co-author of the Nuremberg Chronicle (born 1437/47){{cite book|author=Christoph Reske|title=Die Produktion der Schedelschen Weltchronik in Nürnberg|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=SK_bsN3X7scC&pg=PA164|year=2000|publisher=Otto Harrassowitz Verlag|isbn=978-3-447-04296-3|pages=164|language=de}}

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{{Year in literature article categories}}