Galileo employed his scientific acumen to engage in the literary debates of the day. Here he considered the merits of Tasso and Ariosto, comparing both with Dante. Using his new physics of tensile strength, Galileo refuted Ariosto’s indiscriminate descriptions of giants. Galileo also gave lectures on Dante, employing the techniques of Archimedes to analyze the dimensions of Dante’s hell. This poem became one of the most widely read works of European literature in the 17th century. Tasso created serious characters with human flaws, psychological depth, and even melancholy, setting them in the inspirational but ambiguous era of the Crusades. Despite Tasso’s popularity, Galileo preferred the more ironic and light-hearted Orlando Furioso of Ariosto, which he could recite at length by heart. This is the first edition, small format. Galileo’s work on Tasso was published posthumously. The OU History of Science Collections holds both small and large format editions published in the same year.