Lorenzo Da Ponte
Born in New York City in 1836, Teresa Da Ponte Bagioli was the daughter of the wealthy and well-known Italian singing teacher Antonio Bagioli (1795–1871) and his wife, Maria (or Eliza) Cooke (1819–1894). (Maria was the adopted and alleged "natural" child of Lorenzo Da Ponte.) During her youth, she sometimes lived and studied in the household of her grandfather, Lorenzo da Ponte, the noted music teacher, who had worked as Mozart's librettist on such masterpieces as "The Marriage of Figaro". An exceptionally bright child, Teresa spoke five languages by the time she was a young adult.