LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA. Accession 90G49 . Class /QGiv • cC ^"E-W SER GIOVANNI. Six hundred copies for England and America. No. \TZ I. THE PECORONE OF SER GIOVANNI NOW FIRST TRANSLATED INTO ENGLISH BY W. G. WATERS -o ILLUSTRATED BY E. R. HUGHES, R.W.S. LONDON: LAWRENCE AND BULLEN, LTD. 1 6, Henrietta Street, Covent Garden mdcccxcvii ^^j» tOPfi Contents. PAGE List of Illustrations xi Introduction xiii Proem 3 THE FIRST Day- Novel I. Galgano is enamoured of Madonna Minoccia, wife of Messer Stricca. She is not minded to listen to him ; but, having heard her husband speak great praise of Galgano, she resolves to be cruel to him no longer. The story of the virtuous resolution taken by Galgano, at the moment when he was about to enjoy her 5 Novel II. Bucciolo and Pietro Paolo go to study at Bologna. Bucciolo, having been licensed to practise the law, resolves to return to Rome without his friend, but afterwards settles to wait for him. Meantime he asks the master who has taught him what is the right way to make love. The good fortune which befell him thereanent, and the evil case of the master 8 THE SECOND DAY— Novel I. Madonna Corsina of Naples sends her son to study at Bologna, where he falls sick and dies. Of a device of his contrived so that his mother may not be over-grieved at his death 20 Novel II. Buondelmonte falls in love with Nicolosa, who had married one of the family of Acciaiuoli, foes of the Buondelmonti, and by the help of a serving-woman contrives to gain admission to her bed. The narrative of what the lady did thereupon ; how peace was restored between the two families, and how the young man compassed his vengeance ... 23 THE THIRD DAY— Novel I. Don Placido, a Florentine, travelling to Avignon, finds com- panionship at Nice in Provence with a friar who is also bound to the 90649 CONTENTS. Pope's court. But it transpires that the friar aforesaid is really a lady of Viterbo, who is going to join a certain cardinal. Of the good fortune which befell Don Placido on the road until he came to Avignon ... 32 Novel II. Ceccolo of Perugia, having wasted all his substance over Isabella, the wife of one Lapo, a Florentine, takes service with Lapo as a page. The craft of the lady in taking her pleasure with Ceccolo, and in making him beat her husband with a stick ; and how it fell out that the husband held Ceccolo dearer than ever, notwithstanding 39 THE FOURTH DAY— Novel I. Giannetto after the death of his father goes to Venice, and is received as a son by Messer Ansaldo, a wealthy merchant. Being taken with desire to see the world, he embarks on a ship and sails to the port of Belmonte. What happened to him in his dealings with a certain widow lady of that place, who had promised to marry any man who should lie with her and have enjoyment of her 4.4 Novel II. Count Aldobrandino, a man advanced in years, in order to get to wife the daughter of Carsivalo, induces her father to proclaim a tourna- ment, with the damsel as the first prize thereof. How he proved the victor in the same and won the lady 60 THE FIFTH DAY— Novel I. Chello and Janni of Velletri feign to be soothsayers, in order to cast shame upon the Roman people. They are received by Crassus at the state palace, and they dig up for him certain pieces of money which they had hidden in divers places. They next declare that under the tower of the palace of the tribunes is hidden a vast treasure. Crassus causes the same to be mined and underpinned ; and the soothsayers kindle a fire there. Then they quit Rome, and the next morning the tower falls, with great slaughter of the Roman people 67 Novel II. Janni and Ciucolo betake themselves to Boethius for advice : the one because he found himself with nothing in his pocket at the end of the year, and the other because he had a cross-grained wife. The answer made to them by Boethius 71 THE SIXTH Day- Novel I. Messer Alano, a learned doctor of Paris, went to the court of Rome and took up his residence in a convent of monks as a servant. It chanced that the Pope convoked a consistory to refute the subtleties of Messer Giovan Piero, another doctor of Paris, and a noted heretic ; where- upon Messer Alano, having entered the chamber under the abbot's cope, took part in the dispute. How he made himself known there, and how he confounded the opposing doctor 75 CONTENTS. vii PAGE Novel II. The terrible doom Bernabo Visconti, Duke of Milan, wrought upon Ambrogio, one of his courtiers, and upon a minor friar .... 80 THE SEVENTH DAY— Novel I. The horrible cruelty used by Francesco Orsino towards Lisabetta his wife and other kinsfolk, because of her becoming enamoured of a youth named Rinaldo ; and the wretched end of Messer Orsino ... 84 Novel II. Messer Galeotto Malatesta di Arimino causes Gostanza his niece to be slain barbarously, as well as Ormanno, a German soldier who was wont privily to visit her 87 THE EIGHTH DAY— Novel I. How the parties of the Guelfs and Ghibellines arose, and how the accursed seed of strife was first sown and began to spring in Italy . 93 Novel II. How the exiled Ghibellines of Florence returned thither, and drove out the Guelfs, and with what subtlety they cozened the people of Florence 96 THE NINTH DAY— Novel I. One Maestro Bindo, a Florentine, goes to Venice to set in order the campanile of St. Mark, and he builds likewise a palace for the public service. After a certain time he steals therefrom a cup of gold; and, having gone back thither, he falls into a cauldron of boiling pitch. Ricciardo, his son, cuts off the head from the body, and afterwards Bindo's remains are hung up upon a gibbet. The son carries them off, and buries them in the ground. They try in vain to discover the thief by the temptations of gluttony and of lust, and at last the Doge makes a promise that the guilty man shall receive pardon, and have his own daughter to wife, if he will reveal himself; whereupon Ricciardo goes to the Doge and tells him all, and gets for himself the promised reward . . 102 Novel II. Arrighetto, the emperor's son, having concealed himself within an eagle made of gold, gains entrance to the chamber of the daughter of the King of Aragon. Having come to an agreement with her, he takes her away by sea to Germany. Of the war which ensued thereanent, and of the peace made by the command of the Pope, under pain of excom- munication 113 THE TENTH DAY— Novel I. The King of England takes to wife Dionigia, the daughter of the French king, whom he had found in a convent of his island. She is afterwards brought to bed with two male children in her husband's absence, and is forced, by reason of slander raised against her by her mother-in-law, to leave the court and fly to Rome with her children. By what chance the two kings, rejoicing greatly thereanent, recognize her, the one as his wife, and the other as his sister 127 Novel II. How and at what time the city of Rome was built . . . . 133 b Vlll CONTENTS. THE ELEVENTH DAY— page NovelI. In what manner the city of Florence was built 136 Novel II. In what fashion Attila overthrew the city of Florence . . . 141 THE TWELFTH DAY— Novel I. Charles the Great comes to Italy at the instance of Pope Adrian, and is made emperor H5 Novel II. The Pisans invade Majorca and the Florentines send a guard for their city. In what way they were requited therefor 150 THE THIRTEENTH DAY— Novel I. How the parties of the Neri and the Bianchi first arose . . . 154 Novel II. How Pope Celestine renounced the papacy 156 THE FOURTEENTH DAY— . Novel I. After Celestine, Boniface VIII. was elefted pope. Certain of the great deeds he wrought during his papacy, and how he met his death at the hand of the King of France 160 Novel II. How it came to pass that the court of Rome crossed over the Alps and settled at Avignon 165 THE FIFTEENTH DAY— Novel I. How the world is divided into three parts 17 1 Novel II. How the city of Troy was destroyed, and how the builders thereof were sprung from Fiesole 174 THE SIXTEENTH DAY— Novel I. How ./Eneas passed from Troy into Italy 180 Novel II. A continuation of the argument of the foregoing novel . . . 184 THE SEVENTEENTH DAY— Novel I. A discourse concerning the country and the power of the Tuscans 101 Novel II. How San Miniato with divers other saints suffered martyrdom in the time of Decius the emperor, and how Constantine and all his people became Christians 196 THE EIGHTEENTH DAY— Novel I. Concerning certain kings of Italy, and what deeds they wrought . 202 Novel II. Of the lineage of the Countess Matilda, her riches, the buildings she erected, and her marriage and death 210 CONTENTS. ix THE NINETEENTH DAY— page Novel I. The Emperor Frederic Barbarossa wages war against Pope Alexander III., whereupon the pope goes to France and excommunicates the emperor. Of the wars waged against the Church, and the princes who supported the pope. After divers events, Frederic endeavours to make peace with the Church, and, as an atonement, goes over seas for the rescue of the Holy Land 214 Novel II. Of the descendants of Richard, King of England, and how they took their rise from Normandy 218 THE TWENTIETH DAY— Novel I. Of the Tartars, and of their first emperor named Can. Of his deeds and his descendants 221 Novel II. Virginius slays his daughter Virginia in order to save her honour. Through her death comes to an end the tyranny of the Decemviri in Rome, to wit, of those who exercised the highest office in the republic . 223 THE TWENTY-FIRST DAY— Novel I. The Florentines overthrow the Sienese at the foot of the hill of Vald'Elsa 231 Novel II. How the Guelfs were driven out by the forces of the Emperor Frederic 233 THE TWENTY-SECOND DAY— Novel I. Of a marvel which came to pass in Toledo in the time of Ferdinand, King of Castile and Spain 238 Novel II. Of certain strange doings in Florence. The factions of the Bianchi and Neri at strife with one another. Of a fire which broke out and caused irreparable loss 239 THE TWENTY-THIRD DAY— Novel I. How in the beginning the orders of the Friars Minor and of the Preachers were established 243 Novel II. A stepmother causes one of her slaves to prepare poison for her stepson, because he would not consent to her wishes. Through mischance the potion is drunk by a younger son of her own. The stepson is accused of the crime, and the slave bears witness against him, but an old physician comes forward and deposes how he had given the draught to the slave, and how it was nought more than a narcotic. They all repair to the tomb, where the youth is found alive. The doom that afterwards was given upon the slave and the lady 244 x CONTENTS. THE TWENTY-FOURTH DAY— page Novel I. Giano della Bella, a leading citizen, is driven forth from Florence. The portrait of the same 252 Novel II. Of the death of Messer Corso Donati, a great and powerful citizen of Florence, and a description of him 255 THE TWENTY-FIFTH DAY— Novel I. Democrate of Ricanati determines to entertain certain gentlemen of the outlands with a hunt of wild animals. One of these, a huge she- bear, dies, and some ruffians scheme how they may rob Democrate. One of them puts on the bear's skin, and is shut in a cage by the others, who present the same to Democrate, feigning that a friend of his, an Albanian, has sent the beast as a gift. The thief lets in his friends by night, but a serving-man, hearing the noise, tells how the bear has broken loose. The beast is slain, and the ill-fated thief is discovered 259 Novel II. Urban IV. chooses Charles, Count of Anjou, to be King of Sicily and Apulia, after having taken these lands from Manfred. Of the wars that ensued 262 Three Novels, taken from a manuscript of the "Pecorone" of Ser Giovanni Fiorentino, which are not found in the book as first PRINTED Day XX., Novel II 302 Day XXL, Novel II 304 Day XXV., Novel II 306 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. Day I. Novel Day III. Novel Day IV. Novel Day VII. Novel Day VIII. Novel Day IX. Novel Day IX. Novel Day XIV. Novel Day XVIII. Novel Day XXIII. Novel Day XXIV. Novel II. A Lesson in Love .... I. The Flight of Petruccia I. The Lady of Belmonte . . II. Gostanza's Prayer .... II. BOCCA DEGLI UBERTI . . . I. The Master Thief .... II. Arrighetto and the Princess I. Pope Boniface at Alagna . II. The Countess Matilda II. A Timely Rescue .... II. The Death of Corso Donati To face page 14 37 49 9i 99 106 115 163 212 250 257 *3 Wj>bk\^&±± - v 'JU _P^ 'spm ^wfi 3JntroDuctiom XCEPT in the case of Boccaccio the personal history of the Italian novelists is exceedingly fragmentary, meagre, and obscure. Oblivion has fallen thickly over all of them. A few scattered notices in the pages of his contemporaries, and allusions to himself in the prologues and epilogues of his stories, mark the limits of our knowledge of Masuccio. Of Straparola even less is known. If Sacchetti is less nominis umbra it is because the work he left is the product of a very versatile mind, and furnishes us with glimpses of his personality and character from divers and divergent points of view. The image of Ser Giovanni Fiorentino, the author of the " Pecorone," has been found so elusive and unsubstantial that some there are who main- tain that the writer in question was not the industrious plagiarist of the historian Giovanni Villani, but Giovanni Villani himself. 1 When all the biographical details relating to a particular person are limited to a few isolated facts, these facts will surely be uttered or written down whenever the name of the person in question may be pre- sented for consideration. Under such circumstances a certain monotony is inevitable. Time has left the record of Ser Giovanni's life a blank. The phrases descriptive of the few facts extant concerning him must of necessity be set down here, as they have been given already in other places, and as they will be set down hereafter by any writer who may concern himself with the same subject. Wherefore, since they must be familiar to all those who have ever heard his name, they shall be dealt with in due brevity. 1 Villani died in 1348. This view was suggested by Manni in his " Ulustrazione del Boccaccio," but is scarcely a possible one. xiv INTRODUCTION. Practically all the known references to the writer or compiler of the " Pecorone " are those contained in the sonnet which stands on the first page and in the short Proem in which the scheme of the work is set forth. In the sonnet it is declared that the book was begun in the year 1378, and that the author, Ser Giovanni, had written other books as well. But a cursory examination of the sonnet, and a comparison of it with the lyrics in the other parts of the " Pecorone" will rouse a suspicion that it belongs to a much later period, and could hardly have been written by the author of the rest of the book, whether he wrote as early as 1378 or not. It has all the buffo character of those verses which writers of the fifteenth century were accustomed to place on the opening pages of their books. 1 The very use of the term "II Pecorone" suggests that the work dates from the era of the Italian academies rather than from that given in the sonnet. To call a book " II Pecorone," the big sheep or the simpleton, is exactly what would have been done by a writer who wanted to follow the style of academies like the " Insensati," the " Storditi," or of any other of the kindred societies which sprang up at the beginning of the sixteenth century, such as the coterie " I Vig- naiuoli " at Rome, the members of which called themselves II Mosto, L'Agresto, II Cotogno, and so forth. The proem goes on to tell how the writer, happening to find himself at Dovadola, sore stricken by misfortune and driven hither and thither by evil fate, took up the work of story-telling in the hope of finding therein some consolation and refreshment after all the troubles and calamities he had recently under- gone. The era in question was a momentous one in the history of Florence. The popular and aristocratic parties were about to meet for their final struggle. Seventy years earlier the banishment of Giano della Bella had brought about an increased exacerbation of factious spirit in Florence; and, although victory remained apparently with the popular party, each section thereof bore within itself the seed of weak- ness and decay. No man could trust his leader or colleague, and while the action and policy of the Priori delle Arti were thus weakened and distracted by jealousy, the alliance between the noble families and the popolani grassi, as the rich citizens were called, was being quietly con- solidated. In 1330 the democratic cause in Northern Italy was greatly discredited by the flout put upon it by the submission of many of the Lombard cities to the rule of John, the knight-errant King of Bohemia. 1 If the Sonnet be rejefted as spurious, there is no warrant for the use of the name " Ser Giovanni," but custom, to say nothing of convenience, will allow its repetition. INTRODUCTION. xv Florence stood almost alone as a champion of democracy, and the spectacle of this extension of despotic rule, however benignant the despot, provoked the wrath and distrust of the turbulent Florentine demagogues. To avert the danger which seemed to threaten free institutions, Florence was moved to forget her ancient resentments and to join a league of the Lombard Ghibellines against King John, but this alliance proved a short-lived one, and the several parties thereto were soon fighting amongst themselves. The ill-conduct of this war, and the heavy burden of the consequent taxes, caused great disaffec- tion; even in Florence doubts arose as to the universal excellence and perfection of democratic rule, and the crisis came to an end by the temporary subjection of the state to the tyranny of the Duke of Athens in 1342. Liberty was recovered by the familiar method of a street battle ; but, though she managed to get rid of her tyrant, Florence was greatly weakened and impoverished by the struggle, and, after the further excesses and misrule which prevailed during the Ciompi tumults, the final triumph of the nobili popolani was easily achieved. In 1378, the very same year in which the "Pecorone" is said to have been written, the last struggle took place, and the name of Salvestro dei Medici, who was then elected Gonfalonier, foreshadowed the final extinc- tion of Florentine liberty. In times so unsettled as these, and amongst the cross-divisions of Guelf and Ghibelline, Bianchi and Neri, political proscription and exile were the frequent fate of the Florentine citizen ; wherefore it seems highly probable that the troubles alluded to in the Proem may have been of this nature. The presence of the writer at Dovadola may have been forced, the result of a sentence of exile pronounced against him, or he may have withdrawn there voluntarily out of pique at some turn of affairs in Florentine politics offensive to his Guelf leanings. 1 Dovadola is a village of Romagna near to Forli, lying between Rocca San Casciano and Castrocara. The village is a mean one, and the adjacent country is barren. It did not come under the sway of Florence till' 1440 ; therefore as an independent commune it was in 1378 exactly the place which a Florentine citizen, exiled or disaffected, would have chosen as a place of refuge and residence. Landau, in his " Beitrage zur Geschichte der Italienischen Novelle," employs this incident in support of a theory that the author of the 1 "Sfolgorato e cacciato dalla fortuna, come nel presente libro leggenao potrete vedere." — Proem. The promise made in the concluding words is not kept, as no reference to any calamity which befell the writer occurs in the "Pecorone." C xvi INTRODUCTION. " Pecorone " was a certain Giovanni Cambi. This man had been one of the Gonfaloniers, but was disgraced and deprived of his office for neglect of his duties after the suppression of the Ciompi riots in 1348. Thus, in this particular year, history makes mention of one Giovanni, degraded and most likely banished the city, and the proem of the " Pecorone " tells of another, " sfolgorato e cacciato dallafortuna" who had taken refuge at Dovadola. The evidence that they were one and the same person is not conclusive, but Landau's suggestion is at least worth notice. From the fact that he writes himself down as "Ser" Giovanni it has been assumed that he followed the calling of a notary, for the reason that in Florence the prefix aforesaid was one generally used by members of this profession. Brunetto Latini, who was a notary, always adopted it, and Don Placido Puccinelli, in his work, " Delia Fede e Nobilta del Notaro," says that this style was allowed to all notaries, forasmuch as this profession was one chiefly practised by men of good family. But no investigator has yet been able to identify the writer of the " Pecorone " with any particular man of law. Just at this period men of letters, in a transient fit of modesty, seem to have abstained from setting down any record concerning themselves, and the professional annalists ignored them entirely. The state was convulsed by wars and revolutions, and men in these troublesome days would have found little leisure to read Ser Giovanni's stories, and even less to spend in making any record of his doings for the benefit of pos- terity. But later on certain writers found diversion in trying to settle definitely his place in the world. The Canonico Bisconi, in his appendix to Cinelli's "History of Florentine Authors," makes the startling assertion that the author of the " Pecorone " was, in his belief, the first general of the Franciscan order, following the blessed Francis himself. 1 He bases this strange contention on a remark made by Antonio Maglia- becchi in a letter written to the Canonico Panciatichi. Magliabecchi, who is speaking of legists in general, goes on to tell of a certain Ser Giovanni who at one time had occupied the position of judge at Citta di Castellana. This man on account of some strange accident which befell him — no details are given — resolved to forsake the world and to join the Franciscan order, of which he ultimately became general. Signor Gaetano Poggiali, in his introduction to the edition of the c< Pecorone " published at Leghorn in 1793, makes mention of this legend, and in 1 Saint Francis died in 1226, and his successor was called Elias, and not Giovanni. It was upon the apostasy of this Elias in 1240 that some of the earliest satiric verses in the popular tongue were written. INTRODUCTION. xvii addition alludes to a poem written by a Messer Giovanni Fiorentino in ottava rima, called" L'Istoria del Mondo fallace," which poem he describes as forming a part of the library of religious poetry colle&ed by Gian Donati. Chronologically it seems to have been some years later than Dante, and it was certainly one of the earliest of Italian printed books. Poggiali suggests the theory that this work might have been written by the author of the "Pecorone;" but, as he had never seen it — he declares it to be exceedingly scarce — he refrains judiciously from any more definite assertion, and likewise refuses to admit that its religious character goes in any way to prove that its author — whether he wrote the " Pecorone " or not — took charge of the Franciscan order on the founder's death. Recent criticism, however, has taken a more destructive line. Pro- fessor de Gubernatis x has written with great ingenuity to demonstrate that the personality of Ser Giovanni is purely mythical ; that the " Pecorone," from certain idiosyncrasies of style, could not have been written in the trecento; and that its proper place is with the other recognized forgeries of literature, the Macpherson of this Ossian being Ludovico Domenichi, the editor of the first edition published in 1558. 2 The utterances of so illustrious a critic deserve the most respectful consideration. Signor de Gubernatis makes what seems to be his most weighty point in his opening paragraphs, to wit, in his examination of the prefatory sonnet of the work, " sonetto burchiellesco proemiale che gli st a innanzi e si referisce all' anno 1378, sonetto che a me parve sempre manipolazione e compilazione piu recente, non pur del quattrocento ma del cinquecento." The incongruity of the sonnet with the rest of the work has already been noticed, and the adjective given to it by Professor de Gubernatis admirably marks its origin. Burchiello was a popular writer of satires and burlesques in the argot of Florence in the first half of the fifteenth century. The sonnet in question has all the spirit of his work, and bears every sign of having been written by someone familiar there- with. Even without the weight of Professor de Gubernatis' adverse judg- ment the case against the sonnet's authenticity is a very strong one. In combatting the view that the residue of the book, the Proem and the Novels, were written or put together by any other than Domenichi, the professor is satisfied that certain expressions found in the dedication of the first edition to Lucia Bertana stamp the body of the work as a farrago of his own, and that in the Proem itself there are many turns of style, 1 "Lezioni sui Novellieri Italiani." 2 Poggiali, in his introdu&ion to the edition of 1793, speaks of a forged edition published at Milan with the date of 1 554. xviii INTRODUCTION. such as " scintilla di refrigerio" u portare il giuoco * dello sfavillante amore" which suggest a date far later than 1378. He maintains that the mention of the reigning emperor as well as the reigning pope — an attempt to flatter both at the same breath — is much more characteristic of a courtly pedant of the cinquecento than of a Guelf exile in 1378. The awkwardness and tenuity of the bond by which the stories are held together is exactly the sort of work which a man with Domenichi's antecedents would execute. 2 But the most telling bit of internal evidence against the early date of the " Pecorone" that he can produce is a citation from Day IX., Novel II., in which the style of duke and count is given to the ruler of Savoy. The dignity of duke was not — according to Professor de Gubernatis — assumed till the year 1391, and he holds that this anticipation proves the story in question to have been written after, and not before, this date. It may be remarked that this prince is twice referred to in the novel, once as ct conte " and once as " conte e duca" Another charge of anachronism does not seem to hold good. Professor de Gubernatis, quoting as an authority Professor Errea, main- tains that Day XII., Novel II., must have been written after 1406, as it contains an allusion to the capture of Pisa by the Florentines in that year. This comment is scarcely correct. The Novel is made up of three chapters of Giovanni Villani's tf Chronicles," iv. 30, vi. 2 and 3, and describes the Pisan expedition to Majorca in 11 17, and the trick played upon the Florentines in the matter of the porphyry columns which still stand on the walls of the Baptistery; the quarrel of the envoys of Pisa and Florence at the coronation of Frederic II., and the consequent war, which came to an end by the battle of Castel del Bosco in 1222. The compiler of the novel says in conclusion that the pride of the Pisans was for this time brought low, 3 but makes no mention of the final subjugation by Florence. Every word might have been written in 1378. With regard to the ascription of the book to Domenichi as a collector and embellisher rather than as a creator the arguments of Signor de Gubernatis, though largely conjectural, are ingenious and not wanting 1 This is manifestly a lapsus calami. All editions have "giogo." 2 Domenichi was of Piacenza. He is best known in letters by his quarrel with Doni, who pursued him with great virulence and caused him to be imprisoned at Florence. He translated Boethius, and collefted a book of " Facetie Motti e Burle, o Detti e Fatti di diversi Signori." He also brought out a slovenly rifacimento of the " Orlando Innamorato." 3 "E cosi fu attuato per quella volt a il rigoglio de 1 Pisani." INTRODUCTION. xix in cogency. There are extant three MSS. of the " Pecorone," the Trivulzian, the Magliabecchian, 1 and the Laurentian. Of these the first-named is Milanese and the others Florentine. Signor de Gubernatis has never collated these MSS., but he is evidently of the opinion that examination would show them all to be the work of one and the same hand ; that of Ludovico Domenichi. Here, he says, in speaking of the " Pecorone," is a collection of novels ; a few original, a few taken from Boccaccio and the Fabliaux, and the residue made up of borrowings from Villani, Livy, and Apuleius. It is given to the world by a man bearing a bad reputation even in those days, the companion of Doni and Pietro Aretino and a member of the nefarious Accademia Ortolana ofPiacenza. As a translator of Boethius he would have become familiar with Latin, and that he had loose notions as to meum and tuum in his labour of the pen is shown by an extract from Tiraboschi, who asserts that Domenichi published as his own a tragedy called c< Progne," which was nothing but a translation from the Latin of Gregorio Corraro. Moreover, his quarrel with Doni arose over charges and counter-charges of literary theft, his dialogue Delia Stampa being copied closely from the De Marmi of Doni. His work has all gone down to deserved oblivion, but what success he did reap was gained as a raffazonatore, a collector and shaper of other men's work. His own collections are ill-digested, ill-set, and incon- gruous, and in this respect do not differ widely from the "Pecorone." In one place he speaks of himself as a man stricken by severe mis- fortune, 2 one to whom the words used in the Proem, " sfolgorato e cacciato" would specially apply. In 1 548 Domenichi published a book, " Delia nobilta delle donne," and in the preface of the same he writes, cc As I have not digestion strong enough to assimilate the food I have taken, I carry within me a mass of crude matter. This arises, however, not from any fault of the food I have just swallowed, but from my own ill-regulated stomach. Further- more, I have mingled therewith something of my own, and by so doing may perchance have spoilt what would otherwise have proved to be good and wholesome." Here, in Domenichi's own words, Professor de Gubernatis finds a close description of his method of writing — a method 1 Poggiali declares that this MS. is almost illegible. He speaks also of a MS. fragment of the "Pecorone" bound up with the "Ninfale Fiesolano " of Boccaccio in his own collection of Codici di Lingua. This he affirms to be in the handwriting of the trecento. 2 " Prima to ho difficult a quanto alcun altro del nostro tempo, e non altrimente che s* to fossi stato sbandito e scacciato fuor della patria mia." — Dialogo con La Fortuna. xx INTRODUCTION. which assuredly resembles strongly that of the author or compiler of the " Pecorone," to wit, the admixture of a small quantity of original matter with a large mass of undigested borrowings. The date given as the birthday of the " Pecorone " falls upon a point of time when the spirit and tradition of Provencal literature, which had penetrated Italy some century and a half before, were still perceptible. That form of feudalism which had fostered the growth of this quaintly curious exotic was peculiar to the lands lying beyond the Alps. The traditions of loyal service prevalent in France, Spain, and the Empire formed a milieu in which the literature of romance burgeoned with rank luxuriance. A growth of this character could scarcely have struggled into being amidst the easy unrestrained civic life and the democratic ethos of contemporary Italy, where the pride of feudal aristocracy and the pomp of chivalry were almost entirely wanting ; it would never even have taken root as a transplanted flower in Sicily had it not been for the infusion of French and German sentiment, introduced and nurtured by the courtiers of the Norman and Swabian rulers of the island, and encouraged by the patronage and participation of the monarchs them- selves. As early as n 66 the Norman King of Sicily, William II., gathered round him at Palermo a band of Provencal troubadours, and the taste for letters thus initiated grew rapidly, and became the central interest in the court of Frederic II. In Piedmont and Lombardy feudal customs gained a stronger hold because of the close neighbourhood of the transalpine kingdoms, and as a result troubadour literature raised its head there above all other, and rivalled the excellencies of Provence itself. 1 Thus, while in the north poetic literature assumed a form sympathetic with feudal environment, feudalism itself, neither in Lombardy nor in Italy generally, ever became the potent factor in social life it was in other parts of Europe. In its flight from Provence to Naples, and from Naples to Tuscany, romantic poetry preserved some- thing of its original form, but the life of the flower flagged and declined after the wrench which separated it from its native soil. The sap rose feebly ; it languished in the unfamiliar air of the Sicilian court — albeit congenial surroundings were not wanting — and it suffered complete 1 In a celebrated passage in the "Purgatorio " Dante alludes to this characteristic — " In sul paese ch 1 Adige e Po riga, Solea valore e cortesia trovarsi Prima che Federigo avesse briga." Purg. y xvi. INTRODUCTION. xxi transformation as soon as it was brought into contact with the rough national life of the free city of Florence. 1 In the middle of the thirteenth century Tuscany produced Guido Guinicelli and Guittone d'Arezzo, the earliest writers in the lingua materna whose verses are worthy of notice, but as yet the tongue of Northern France, rather than the Langue d'oc, was affected by men of letters. Brunetto Latini wrote the " Tesoro" in French, and Saint Francis used the same tongue for his early hymns. Guido Guinicelli 2 and Guittone d'Arezzo wrote with a depth of feeling quite alien to the light- ness and animation of the troubadours, and with a perfection of form which allows their work to be placed alongside that of Petrarch himself. It bears traces of those sterner surroundings amidst which the national life of Italy was being moulded. The rise of the great schools of Bologna and Salerno, and of the commercial states, led men to think of other matters than jousting and gallantry. Italy became the land of jurists, scholars, and philosophers. Poets there were, no doubt, 3 but when they sang of love, they were wont to treat it as a principle, a Platonic abstraction, rather than as a passion living and real — as an influence on human character rather than as an ecstasy. These scholarly singers fashioned themselves on classical models, and favoured a style which was quite unfit to deal with the undisciplined extravagance of Provencal themes. The attributes of chivalrous love, when they had passed through the mind of the Tuscan master, were presented afresh in the form of philosophical doctrine. The body and soul of the worshipped object were sublimated into the most exalted expression of beauty and spiritual excellence ; the classic instances of such a process were the personalities of Beatrice and Laura, and the fainter and belated figure of the fair Geraldine, the object of Surrey's pathetic love. But the gay science did not long survive its northward flight to Tuscany, and by the middle of the fourteenth century it had practically ceased to be. Still, the ghost of this dead and gone Provencal culture must have 1 The loss of civic rights consequent on ennoblement is an evidence of the low esteem the Florentines had for chivalry. a Dante honours him as his father in letters — " £>uando P ud? nomar se stesso il padre Mio, e degli altri miei miglior, che mai Rime d'amore usar dolci e leggiadre" Purg., xxvi. 3 Guido Guinicelli's poem of "The Gentle Heart" is one of the best examples. It is translated in Rossetti's " Early Italian Poets." xxii INTRODUCTION. been walking in the days with which the proem of the Cf Pecorone " proposes to treat, and furthermore the writer of the same, whoever he may have been, must at some time or other have come across some story — peradventure that of Geffroi Rudel and Melisande of Tripoli — telling how the true lover was wont to worship the lady of his heart for no other reason than from having heard the report of her graces and perfections. The memory of some legend of this kind must have been haunting him when he first conceived the idea of his proem and of the quaintly frigid setting which he gave to his stories. Auretto, the youth who plays the lover's part in this duologue — amorous indeed, but ruled by a punctilio rigid enough to light up with additional glow of humour the occasional lapses of the lovers into the natural speech and action of human beings — had become enamoured of the beauteous nun Saturnina, not by the sight of her charms, but by the glowing report of her various excellencies which had come to his ears by chance rumour. By losing his heart in this fashion Auretto was following strictly the rule of troubadour etiquette, and in the