The aim of this article is to draw attention to 'literary' names in humanist epistolography, by means of examples of interpretation and of an ironic, mocking and disruptive playing with names, taken mainly from the epistulae familiares of prominent late fifteenth-century intellectuals. The first part of my paper contains a selection of names from the correspondence of Marcantonio Sabellico. The second, which includes other literary genres, examines the case of Angelo Poliziano, whose cognomen seems to have been specially designed for readings that were either adulatory or witty, and sometimes simply offensive, in the writings of his contemporaries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]