1584 in literature

Events

• date unknown – Master Thomas Giles takes charge of the Children of Paul's, a company of boy actors. This is the start of a close association with the works of John Lyly.

  New books

Prose

• Giordano Bruno – La Cena de le Ceneri
• John Dee – 48 Claves angelicae
• James VI of Scotland – Some Reulis and Cautelis to be observit and eschewit in Scottis poesie
• David Powel – The Historie of Cambria, now called Wales
• Reginald Scot – The Discoverie of Witchcraft
• Richard Stanihurst – De rebus in Hibernia gestis
• Lucas Janszoon Waghenaer – Spiegel der Zeevaerdt

  Drama

• 'A.M.' – Fidele and Fortunio
• Robert Wilson – The Three Ladies of London

  Poetry

• Thomas Watson – Hekatompathia or Passionate Centurie of Love

  Births

• May – André Duchesne, French geographer and historian
• August 29 – Patrick Young, Scottish scholar and royal librarian
• September 15 – Georg Rudolf Weckherlin, German poet
• December 16 – John Selden, English polymath
• unknown dates
• * Francis Beaumont, English dramatist and poet
• *Anna Ovena Hoyer, German/Swedish poet
• *Hu Zhengyan, Chinese artist, printmaker, calligrapher and publisher

  Deaths

• February 18 – Antonio Francesco Grazzini, Italian prose writer
• March 10 – Thomas Norton, English lawyer, politician and poet
• June 13 – János Zsámboky, Hungarian humanist, philologist and historian
• July 23 – John Day, English Protestant printer
• August 12 – Carolus Sigonius, Italian humanist writer
• November 21 – Turrianus, Spanish Jesuit Hellenist and polemicist
• unknown dates
• *Stephen Batman, English translator
• *Gerhard Dorn, Flemish philosopher, translator and polymath
• *Alonso Gutiérrez, Spanish philosopher