Giovanni was the son of a well-known mathematician, Andrea Argoli, and was born at Tagliacozzo in the Abruzzi. At the age of fifteen he published a poem on the silkworm, Bombace e Seta (Rome, 1624). Two years later, emulous of the reputation Marino had just gained with his Adone, the young Argoli is said to have shut himself in an apartment, where he was visited only by servants bringing his food, and in seven months, at the age of seventeen, produced his Endimione (Rome, 1626). It met with a success apparently at least equal to the author's hopes. In 1632 he followed his father to Padua (where the latter was professor of mathematics), taking the doctorate in law. Yet he returned to literature, which he taught with success at Bologna until about 1640. Thereafter he again turned to the law, and held office in the government of Cervia and Lugo. In addition to his Italian verse, Argoli produced a number of poems in Latin, and several works on archaeology and philology. Among these last are notes on the De Ludis Circensibus of Onofrio Panvinio (Padua 1642). Giovanni Argoli was a member of the Umoristi, Gelati, and Incogniti academies.

• Idillio de la Bombace, e Seta. Trasformationi pastorali (in Italian), Roma: nella stamperia della Cam. Apost., 1624
• L'Endimione poema di Giouanni Argolo all'illustrissimo, & eccellentissimo sign. don Filippo Colonna (in Italian) (1 ed.), Terni: nella stamperia di Tomasso Guerrieri, 1626
• Iatro-laurea Gabrielis Naudaei Parisini a Leone Allatio inaugurata Graeco carmine; Latine reddita a Bartholomaeo Tortoletto et Joanne Argolo (in Latin), Romae: typis Iacobi Mascardi, 1633
• Onuphrii Panvinii Veronensis De Ludis Circensibus Libri II - De Triumphis Liber unus - Quibus universa fere Romanorum veterum sacra, ritusque declarantur, ac figuris aeneis illustrantur, cum notis J. Argoli J.U.D. et additamento N. Pinelli (in Latin) (1 ed.), Padova: typis P. Frambotti, 1642
• Reprinted in: Johann Georg Graevius (ed.), Thesaurus antiquitatum romanarum, IX, Leida, Petrus van der Aa, 1699. (Online)
• Liceti, Fortunio (1640). "De lapide speculari veterum, de Gypso in Herculis Clypeo, et de impostura lapidis indici apud Thuanum". De Quaesitis per Epistolas a Claris Viris Responsa Fortunii Liceti: 112 ff.
• Epistola ad Jacobum Philippum Tomasinum de templo Dianae Nemorensis, in: Giacomo Filippo Tomasini, De donariis ac tabellis votivis liber singularis, Padova, 1654 in-4 pag. 13 ff.; reprinted in: Johann Georg Graevius (ed.), Thesaurus antiquitatum romanarum (in Latin), vol. XII, pp. 751 ff.