Andrea Matteo Acquaviva

Andrea Matteo Acquaviva, 8th Duke of Atri (1458–1529) was an Italian nobleman and condottiero from the Kingdom of Naples. Born in Conversano, Puglia, he was the second son of Duke Giulio Antonio Acquaviva and his wife, Caterina Orsini del Balzo. She was a first cousin of Queen Isabella, the wife of King Ferrante of Naples.

He and his brothers were educated in Naples by the humanist scholar Giovanni Pontano. In 1464, he became Marquis of Bitonto. In September 1477, Andrea Matteo married Isabella Piccolomini of Aragon, the daughter of King Ferrante's natural daughter, Maria of Aragon. Maria's husband, Antonio Todeschini Piccolomini, Duke of Amalfi, was a nephew of Pope Pius II and brother of Pope Pius III.

Andrea Matteo distinguished himself as a partisan of the French. He was made prisoner by Consalvo of Cordova and carried into Spain; but his confinement was not long; and on his return to Naples he became a patron of letters. He was kept away from political life, due to suspicion of his past as an advocate of the French cause. In 1510, Andrea Matteo and other barons assembled in Naples Cathedral to protest the introduction of the Spanish Inquisition into the territory. The following year, he returns the collar of the French Order of Saint Michael. He died in Puglia in 1529.

To literary men, he was indeed a benefactor—hence the encomia which have been lavished upon him, and which, more than any merit of his own, obtained him distinction. Yet he wrote one book at least, a commentary on the Latin translation of Plutarch's Moralia. A member of the Accademia Pontaniana, he was one of the most important humanist princes in southern Italy.