The Decameron

The next storyteller is Pampinea. Berto della Massa is a petty criminal who relocates to Venice in search of new targets. Despite his criminal intentions, he adopts a new identity as a Franciscan friar named Alberto. The people of Venice believe that Alberto is “a man of quite extraordinary humility” (538) and, soon enough, he rises through the ranks and becomes a trusted priest. He meets “a frivolous and scatterbrained young woman” (539) named Monna Lisetta and decides that she is the perfect target for his scams. He tells Lisetta that the Angel Gabriel appeared to him in a dream to praise her beauty. Convincing Lisetta that the angel wishes to take on a human form to “spend a little time in [her] company” (541), he tricks her into thinking that the angel will appear to her in Alberto’s body. He dresses as an angel and has sex with Lisetta.

Rumors about their relationship spread through the community because Lisetta cannot help but tell people that Gabriel “is forever coming down to keep me company” (545). Her family hears the rumor and immediately understand what has happened. They chase Alberto, who jumps into Venice’s Grand Canal to escape. A neighbor spots him in the water and brings Alberto into his house. When the man realizes that Alberto is the false angel from the rumors, however, he hatches a plan to help Alberto escape in exchange for money. He dresses Alberto as the wild, beastly central figure from a traditional festival which takes place every year in Venice. During the festival, a wild man is hunted. The neighbor tricks Alberto into taking on the role of the wild man to give him an opportunity to escape. In reality, he leads Alberto to the city square in chains, slathered in honey and covered in feathers. When the crowd is ready, the man removes Alberto’s mask to reveal “the Angel Gabriel, who descends by night from Heaven to earth to amuse the women of Venice” (548). The crowd shouts and mocks Alberto. He is only saved by the local priests, who drag him away from the bloodthirsty crowd and imprison him in their monastery for the rest of his life.

The next storyteller is Lauretta. In Marseilles, three teenaged sisters fall in love with three different young men. All six run away to Crete, a Greek island, where they live in a small community so that they can enjoy the “delectable fruits of their love” (554). One day, however, the oldest of the three sisters discovers that her partner has been unfaithful to her. She poisons him “in a paroxysm of rage” (555) and she is arrested for murder. To save her sister from being executed, the middle sister offers to have sex with the Duke of Crete. The Duke frees the eldest sister as “payment for his night of pleasure” (557) but her partner finds out about her betrayal. Overcome with jealous fury, he murders his partner before running away from Crete with the eldest sister. As a result, the authorities charge the youngest sister and her partner with the murders. The couple manages to bribe the prison guards and they escape from Crete, though they are forced to live the rest of their lives “in poverty and distress” (558) in Rhodes.

The next storyteller is Elissa. The King of Sicily’s grandson is named Gerbino. Even though he has never met her, Gerbino falls in love with the daughter of the King of Tunis. They exchange love letters across the sea via a friend of Gerbino. She tells him that his romantic feelings are mutual. However, she is already betrothed to the King of Granada. Gerbino—feeling “the agonies of the damned” (561)—disobeys his grandfather, who has already officially assured the King of Tunis that Gerbino will not interfere. Gerbino sets out to stop the marriage by intercepting her boat on her way to her wedding. When he reaches her, however, his attempt fails. She is killed in the fight and Gerbino, driven insane by passion and grief, kills everyone around him “without mercy” (564). The King of Tunis lodges his complaint about the matter with the King of Sicily. The King of Sicily has no choice other than to sentence his grandson to death. Gerbino is beheaded, with the King “preferring to lose his only grandson rather than gain the reputation of being a monarch whose word was not to be trusted” (565).

The next storyteller is Filomena. Lorenzo and Lisabetta are two young lovers from Messina. Lisabetta is of a higher social class than Lorenzo, who works for her family. Lisabetta’s oldest brother catches his sister entering Lorenzo’s chambers. He keeps quiet and plans with his brothers “to rid themselves of this ignominy” (567), in which they will kidnap Lorenzo and kill him outside the city walls. They will tell their sister that he went away for work reasons. After they murder Lorenzo, his ghost appears to Lisabetta during a dream, “pallid-looking and all disheveled, his clothes tattered and decaying” (568). Lorenzo’s ghost tells Lisabetta what her brothers did and tells her where they buried his body. Lisabetta finds Lorenzo’s body and cuts off his head before reburying him. At home, Lisabetta places the severed head in a plant pot. She covers the head with earth and uses the pot to grow basil, which she waters with “her own teardrops” (569). The basil grows quickly but her strange behavior catches her brothers’ attention. They take Lisabetta’s basil plant. When she begs for the plant and sinks into a deep depression, they look beneath the earth. They find the severed head of Lorenzo. Worried that they will be caught, they bury Lorenzo’s head again before running away to Naples. Lisabetta mourns the loss of her lover and her plant. Eventually, she dies alone and songs are sung about her death.

The next storyteller is Panfilo. In Brescia, Gabriotto and Andreuola are neighbors who fall in love. Their relationship is complicated because Gabriotto is “a man of low estate but full of admirable qualities” (572). They must meet secretly in her family’s garden and they recruit her maid to help them. They are essentially married, though they cannot formalize their relationship. On one tragic night, after a series of worrying omens and “forebodings” (573), Gabriotto dies while they are meeting. Andreuola cannot tell anyone about the body because she must keep her relationship secret. When she and her maid try and drag Gabriotto to his family home, however, they are caught by a guard. They are taken to a judge, who makes sexual advances toward Andreuola, promising her that, “if she would yield to his pleasures, he would set her at liberty” (578). She refuses him. After the coroner finds Andreuola and her maid innocent of killing Gabriotto, Andreuola and her maid live “long and virtuous lives as nuns” (580).

The next storyteller is Emilia. Simona and Pasquino are very much in love, though they are hindered by their poverty. While cleaning his teeth with herbs during a meeting in a secretive place, Pasquino dies. Simona is accused of poisoning her lover. She is dragged in front of a judge, who demands to know what happened. He takes them back to the secret garden so Simona can reenact the scene. A “petrified” (585) Simona repeats Pasquino’s action, rubbing the herbs on her teeth. She dies in exactly the same way. The judge examines the place where the herbs were gathered. Digging up the plant, he finds “an incredibly large toad, by whose venomous breath they realized that the bush must have been poisoned” (586), and acquits Simona. The lovers are buried side-by-side.

The next storyteller is Neifile. Girolamo and Salvestra are young lovers, though he is from a far wealthier family. Girolamo cannot get his mother’s approval for the relationship, as Salvestra is merely “the daughter of a tailor” (588). When his mother sends him to live in Paris, he loses contact with Salvestra. He returns to Italy after one year to discover that Salvestra has married another man, though he is “more deeply in love than before” (589). Desperate to talk to her, he visits Salvestra’s house at night. Salvestra sees him but insists that she is very much in love with her new husband. In protest, Girolamo holds his breath. He holds his breath so long that he dies. Salvestra wakes her husband and, together, they carry Girolamo’s body to his house and dump it on the doorstep. The next day, people assume that he “died of grief” (592) having seen Salvestra with another man. After he is buried, however, Salvestra cannot stop thinking about him. The “surfeit of grief” (593) for the life she might have led with Girolamo kills Salvestra, who throws herself over his dead body. Recognizing the young couple’s love, the families bury Girolamo and Salvestra side-by-side.

The next storyteller is Filostrato. Two knights named Guillaume live in Provençe. Guillaume de Cabestanh is very much in love with Guillaume de Roussillon’s attractive wife. Cabestanh begins an affair with the wife of his fellow knight, who eventually uncovers the infidelity. While travelling to a tournament, Roussillon kills Cabestanh and cuts out his friend’s heart. Roussillon sends the heart to the cook in his house and tells him to prepare it for “the finest and most succulent dish you can devise” (597), pretending that it belonged to a wild boar. When the heart is served, Roussillon watches as his wife eats her lover’s heart. He tells her that the delicious meal was “in fact the heart of Guillaume de Cabestanh” (598). However, she accuses her husband of blaming the wrong person. She announces that—because she has now eaten the most perfect meal—she will never eat again. She kills herself by throwing herself from a window, whereupon she is “not only killed by her fall but almost completely disfigured” (599). Roussillon fears for his life. He leaves the town before the truth is uncovered. Cabestanh and Roussillon’s wife are buried together.

The final storyteller is Dioneo. After a woman marries a doctor many years her senior, she has an affair with a younger man named Ruggieri, who is “notorious throughout Salerno for his acts of larceny and for other highly unsavory activities” (601). She invites Ruggieri into her home and, while there, Ruggieri consumes one of the medicinal potions left laying around by her husband. The anesthetic medicine knocks him unconscious but she is worried that he is dead. Devising “some means for getting his body out of the house” (603), she hides his body in her neighbor’s chest. However, the chest is stolen by two young men. They take the chest and bring it back to their home. Ruggieri wakes up in a chest in a strange home. The wives of the young thieves scream and accuse the dazed, confused Ruggieri of being a burglar. He is immediately arrested and sentenced to be “hanged by the neck at the earliest opportunity” (606). He is only saved when the doctor’s wife convinces her maid to lie on her behalf and tell everyone that she was having an affair with Ruggieri. Eventually, he is set free and he resumes his affair with the woman.