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The Decameron
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First DayChapter Summaries & Analyses
Preface and Introduction Summary
In a short preface, Boccaccio explains that he wrote The Decameron after a brief but intense romantic relationship taught him about the importance of compassion. Only by talking to his friend and sharing stories did he deal with the intensity of his love for the unnamed woman. Boccaccio wants to help those in a similar situation, especially women. He regrets that women lack many of the freedoms that men enjoy. In the novel, he explains, seven women and three men will tell each other 100 stories, each telling one story a day for ten days. He hopes the stories will offer guidance.
The Decameron is set in Florence, Italy. The city is suffering greatly from the Black Death, a bubonic plague which spread through Europe in the mid-14th century and killed millions of people. Traditional morals have fallen by the wayside and people feel as though the world is ending. As the plague is spreading through the population of Florence, seven young women—none “older than twenty-seven or younger than eighteen” (186)—gather together. The eldest of the friends, Pampinea, suggests that they escape to a villa in the countryside where they will “have a clearer view of the heavens” (189). Elissa and Filomena suggest that they invite three men to accompany them to “readily act as our guides and servants” (191). The men—who happen to be passing by the piazza at the same time—agree and the group heads to the countryside. The women are Pampinea, Filomena, Fiammetta, Emilia, Elissa, Lauretta, and Neifile. The men are Filostrato, Panfilo, and Dioneo.
At the villa in the countryside, Pampinea wants to pass the time by telling stories which “may afford some amusement both to the narrator and to the company at large” (197) and which will prevent the men and women from engaging in any scandalous sexual activities. For the following ten days (not counting four days set aside for religious purposes), each guest will tell one story each day. The theme for each day will be chosen by a respective king or queen; each guest will rule for one day and will decide the theme and the day's entertainment.
First Day, First Story Summary
The first storyteller is Panfilo. Ciappelletto is a notoriously evil man with no morals. A merchant named Musciatto Franzesi hires Ciappelletto to recover the payment for “certain loans” (199) from a group of Burgundians who are “full of tricks” (201). While travelling to collect the debt, he becomes ill and asks for a priest. Fearing that he is dying, Ciappelletto makes a confession to “a most venerable” (203) priest. However, his confession is filled with lies. The priest believes that Ciappelletto is “a very saintly man” (210). When Ciappelletto dies, the priest buries him at a nearby monastery. Soon, Ciappelletto's legend spreads in the community and they believe he is something of a saint. People thank Saint Ciappelletto for miracles, even though he told nothing but lies during his lifetime.
First Day, Second Story Summary
The next storyteller is Neifile. An “extremely honest and upright” (214) French merchant named Jehannot de Chevigny has a Jewish friend named Abraham. Jehannot is concerned that his friend will not go to heaven because he is not a Christian, so he tries to convert Abraham to Christianity. Eventually, Abraham agrees to visit Rome and see the Vatican, though Jehannot does not think this is a good idea as the clergy live “foul and wicked lives” (216). In Rome, Abraham sees the deplorable and corrupt behavior of the Pope and the cardinals. When he returns, he explains to Jehannot that the Vatican is “a hotbed for diabolical rather than devotional activities” (218). However, he believes that Christianity has persevered in spite of the obvious immorality of its religious leaders, which impresses him and leads to his conversion to Christianity.
First Day, Third Story Summary
The next storyteller is Filomena. Saladin is a Muslim leader who has fought many wars. Having spent all his money on his military, he asks a Jewish man named Melchizedek to lend him money to continue his campaigns. When Melchizedek is reluctant, Saladin invites him to the court and asks him which of the three Abrahamic religions (Islam, Christianity, and Judaism) is “truly authentic” (221). If Melchizedek says anything other than Islam, Saladin hopes that he can force the Jewish man to lend him money. Instead of answering, Melchizedek tells a story about a family with a special ring. Rather than choosing one son to inherit the ring, a father has a jeweler make identical copies. The rings are so alike that the sons Cannot choose which one is real. Melchizedek argues that the three religions are like the three rings. Saladin, respecting Melchizedek’s wisdom, befriends Melchizedek. They come to an amicable agreement over the terms of a loan while Saladin gives Melchizedek many “magnificent gifts” (223).
First Day, Fourth Story Summary
The next storyteller is Dioneo. A young monk falls in love with a “strikingly beautiful” (224) woman and invites her to his room. They have sex and the noise attracts the attention of the monastery’s abbot. However, the abbot decides to wait to remonstrate with the monk rather than burst into the room. The monk, noticing the abbot’s presence outside his room, realizes that he has been caught breaking his vow of chastity. After, the monk asks permission to finish his chores. The abbot agrees and—while the monk collects firewood—the abbot visits the monk’s room and finds the young woman. However, the abbot is immediately attracted to her as well. He also has sex with her. The monk, having predicted that the abbot would be unable to refuse the young woman’s charms, returns to his room and sees the abbot in a compromising position. After, he lets the abbot know what he has seen. Realizing that he has been caught, the abbot helps the monk to usher the woman out of the monastery. From then on, they agree that she can visit “at regular intervals” (228).
First Day, Fifth Story Summary
The next storyteller is Fiammetta. The Marchioness of Montferrat is a French noble woman. She learns that the French king plans to visit her while her husband is not at home. Worried that he will make sexual advances toward her, she devises a scheme using chickens and her wits to ensure that the King behaves in an appropriate manner by reminding him of his responsibilities. Her words “extinguish the ill-conceived fires of his passion” (232).
First Day, Sixth Story Summary
The next storyteller is Emilia. In Florence, a Franciscan friar joins the inquisition to make money, rather than due to his faith. He is told about a man “with far more money than common sense” (233) who blasphemed while drunk. The friar tries to extort the wealthy man but the wealthy man, after paying a large fine and performing a public atonement, uses his knowledge of the Bible to criticize the lazy clergy and their “guzzling hypocrisy” (236). Outraged, the friar dismisses the man and never punishes him again.
First Day, Seventh Story Summary
The next storyteller is Filostrato. A “conversationalist of quite extraordinary wit and brilliance” (238) named Bergamino is hired by the Lord of Verona, Can Grande della Scala. However, the typically generous Can Grande has a sudden change of heart and sends away all the entertainers—including Bergamino—without any payment. Bergamino lingers around the Lord's castle to guilt his employer into paying him. Eventually, he tells Can Grande a story about a miserly abbot who refused to pay a poet until he is made “thoroughly ashamed” (242) by the poet. The story works and Bergamino receives his payment.
First Day, Eighth Story Summary
The next storyteller is Lauretta. A wealthy man named Ermino de’ Grimaldi from Genoa has a reputation for being “incomparably greedier and more tight-fisted than every other grasper or miser in the whole wide world” (243). Guiglielmo Borsiere, a personable courtier, hears about Ermino and decides to visit the famous miser. When Ermino asks Guiglielmo for tips on what theme he should employ while decorating his new home, the courtier responds with "generosity" (245). The comment prompts Ermino to reconsider his ways. He transforms into a very generous man.
First Day, Ninth Story Summary
The next storyteller is Elissa. A noblewoman returns to Gascony from a trip to the Holy Land. While travelling through Cyprus, she is attacked by a group of bandits. Annoyed and scared by the incident, she wants to make a complaint to the King of Cyprus but she is warned that he is a fearful, lazy man who will likely do nothing. When she meets the King, she facetiously asks him how to take insults without reacting as he is such a pushover. Her comment shames him into finding the bandits and he “became the implacable scourge of all those who did anything to impugn the honor of his crown” (247).
First Day, Tenth Story Summary
The final storyteller is Pampinea. Master Alberto is a “brilliant physician of almost universal renown” (249). Though he is quite old, he falls in love with Malgherida de’ Ghisolieri, a beautiful young woman. Malgherida and her friends mock the old doctor and decide to play a prank on him. They invite him to drink wine with them and then ask him how he could possibly fall in love with such an attractive woman, so many years his junior. Alberto explains that his old age has taught him to be patient and to have hope. Malgherida appreciates his comments. She sees Alberto in a new light.
First Day Analysis
The opening chapters of The Decameron introduce the author and the framing narrative. Boccaccio inserts himself into the text, beginning the book with an address to the audience. He defends himself and his work while also describing the Black Death and its effect on Florence. In this sense, Boccaccio almost turns himself into a character in his own work. Boccaccio is the narrator but also a character with an agenda, desires, fears, and sympathies. He shares his characters’s loathing of the clergy and confesses that he does not know what will happen to his beloved city in the wake of the devastating plague. Like his characters, Boccaccio is traumatized by the sheer volume of death he has witnessed and his descriptions of the plague establish the social context in which The Decameron was written. Boccaccio, like his characters, is searching for an escape through stories. He fears for the future by looking to the past and hoping that people can forge something new and meaningful from the stories they tell one another. The character of Boccaccio may seem authoritative, commanding, and intelligent. Behind the bluster, however, is the hint of a worried, frightened person who has witnessed thousands of people die and the infrastructure of a city state crumble in a matter of months.
After introducing himself, Boccaccio introduces the brigata. The brigata is the name the young Florentines give themselves when they decide to leave Florence. Like Boccaccio, their characters seem at first to be narrative tools. Like Boccaccio hiding his personality behind his narration, however, the members of the brigata contain subtle and nuanced characterization. Pampinea, for example, is the oldest member of the group and the de facto leader. In the 100 stories which the brigata will tell, a common refrain is that girls are said to be of marriageable age when they reach their mid-teens. Pampinea is almost a decade older than the women in the stories and—at first—she seems to be romantically unattached. Her mature authority contains within it a hint of tragedy: She is unlucky in love and, with so many people dying around her, she will be part of a generation which must remake the world after the collapse. Pampinea is thrust into a position of authority by the conditions of the world around her and she accepts this responsibility. Throughout the book, hints of her possible relationship (and break up) with Filostrato may explain why she has such a defeated attitude toward love, though she never lets her own experiences stand in the way of her desire to help her friends. Though Pampinea and the other members of the brigata may be little more than a framing device for telling the stories which make up the body of the book, their characters and their lives possess a subtle depth which can easily be overlooked.
The first story told by the brigata sets the tone for the stories which will follow. Importantly, the first story introduces the concept of corruption among the clergy. Throughout The Decameron, one of the most common refrains is the portrayal of all members of the clergy as corrupt, self-serving, and occasionally criminal. The first day of The Decameron includes several examples of priests, friars, and nuns who are only interested in furthering their current, earthly self-interest. The frequency of the stories and the lack of any shock or outrage among the members of the brigata suggests that criticism of the clergy is no longer taboo. Indeed, the brigata members accept stories of the corruption among their religious leaders as commonplace. The attitude toward criticism of the religious and descriptions of their corruption illustrate the true extent of the problem. No one—from the brigata members to Boccaccio himself—is afraid of pointing out the clergy’s corruption.
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