1331-1340
THE YEARS OF COURTSHIP--THE REWARD--THE BETRAYAL--THE RETURN TO
FLORENCE
Of the first period of Giovanni's love-story, the period of
uncertainty which lasted but twelve days, we know almost nothing,
save that he was used to remind himself very often of his
unworthiness, and to tell himself that he was only the son of a
merchant, while Fiammetta, it was said, was the daughter of a king,
and at any rate belonged to one of the richest and most powerful
families in the Kingdom. That she was married does not seem to have
distressed him or appeared as an obstacle at all, for the court was
corrupt;[146] but he seems to have been disturbed by the knowledge
that she was surrounded by a hundred adorers richer, nobler, and with
better opportunities than himself. And so he seems to have come to
the conclusion that there was nothing to be done but to make fun of
himself for having entertained a thought of her. It was apparently in
these states of mind that he passed the days from Holy Saturday to
12th April, 1331, when he found suddenly to his surprise that she was
content he should love her if he would.
What happened is described in the forty-fourth chapter of the
_Amorosa Visione_. The twelve days were passed, he tells us in this
allegory, when he heard a voice like a terrible thunder cry to him:--
"O tu ... che nel chiaro giorno
Del dolce lume della luce mia,
Che a te vago sì raggia d' intorno,
Non ischernir con gabbo mia balìa
Nè dubitar però per mia grandezza,
La quale umil, quando vorrai, ti fia,
Onora con amor la mia bellezza,
Nè d' alcun' altra più non ti curare,
Se tu non vo' provar mia rigidezza."
How can we interpret this? It seems that there was evidently
an occasion in which Fiammetta gave him to understand that
she was not averse from his love. What was this occasion?
Della Torre[147]--certainly the most subtle and curious of his
interpreters--thinks he has found it: that he can identify it with
that in which Fiammetta bade him write the _Filocolo_.
[Illustration: SAPOR MOUNTING OVER THE PROSTRATE VALERIAN
_By the Dutch engraver called "The Master of the Subjects in the
Boccaccio." "De Casibus Virorum." (Strasburg, 1476.)_]
In the prologue to that romance Boccaccio tells us that after leaving
the temple of S. Lorenzo with full heart, and having sighed many
days, he found himself by chance--he does not remember how--with some
companions "in un santo tempio del Principe de' celestiali uccelli
nominato": that is to say, as Casetti interprets it, in the convent
of S. Arcangelo a Baiano, where Fiammetta had been. I have said that
it was quite usual for nuns to receive visitors, both men and women,
from the outside; the _Fiammetta_[148] itself confirms it if need be.
The convents were in some sort fashionable resorts where one went to
spend an hour in talk. On some such occasion Boccaccio went to S.
Arcangelo with a friend, and finding Fiammetta there, probably told
her stories from the French romances "del valoroso giovane Florio
figliuolo di Felice grandissimo Re di Spagna," or of Lancelot and
Guinivere, "con amorose parole," stuffed with piteous words. When he
had finished, she, altogether charmed, turned to the young poet
and bade him write such a romance as that--for her--"a little book in
which the beginning of love, the courtship, and the fortune of the
two lovers even to their death shall be told." Well, what could he
do but obey gladly? "Hearing the sweetness of the words which came
from that gracious mouth," he tells us, "and remembering that never
once till this day had that noble lady asked anything of me, I took
her prayer for a command, and saw therein hope for my desires";[149]
so he answered that he would do his best to please her. She thanked
him, and Boccaccio, "costretto più da ragione che da volontà," went
home and began at once to compose his romance.[150] So ends the first
period of his love-story, and the second, the period of courtship,
begins.
The first result of this interview and of the hope and fear it gave
him--for whatever may have been the case with Fiammetta now and
later, Giovanni was genuinely in love--was that he wandered away
"dall' usato cammino" from the highway that had brought him so far
and abandoned "le imprese cose," things already begun.[151] And if
we ask ourselves what was this highway, we may answer his way of
life; and the things already begun--his study of the Canon Law. About
this time, then, he began to go more to court, to enter eagerly into
the joy of Neapolitan life in search of Fiammetta. At the same time
his studies suffered--he neglected them to the dismay, as we shall
see, not only of his father, but of his friends.
Something has already been said of the life at the court of King
Robert. The very soul of it was the three ladies: Agnes de Perigord,
wife of Jean D'Anjou, brother of King Robert; Marie de Valois, wife
of Charles, Duke of Calabria, son of the king; and Catherine de
Courteney, who at twelve years of age had married Philip of Taranto,
another of the King's brothers.[152] The luxury in the city was by
far the greatest to be found in Italy. The merchants of Florence,
Lucca, Venice, and Genoa furnished to the court "scarlatti di Gant,"
"sciamiti, panni ricamati ad uso orientale," "oggetti d' oro ed
argento," and "gemmas et lapides pretiosas ad camere regie usum."
Boccaccio himself describes Naples: "Città, oltre a tutte l' altre
italiche, di lietissime feste abbondevole, non solamente rallegra
i suoi cittadini o con le nozze o con li bagni o con li marini
liti, ma, copiosa di molti giuochi, sovente or con uno, or con un
altro letifica la sua gente: ma tra l' altre cose, nelle quali essa
appare splendidissima, è nel sovente armeggiare."[153] Or again of
the spring there: "I giovani, quando sopra i correnti cavalli con
le fiere armi giostravano, e quando circondati da' sonanti sonagli
armeggiavano, quando con ammaestrata mano lieti mostravano come gli
arditi cavalli con ispumante freno si debbano reggere. Le giovani
donne di queste cose vaghe, inghirlandate di nuove frondi, lieti
sguardi porgevano ai loro amanti, ora dall' alte finestre ed ora
dalle basse porte; e quale con nuovo dono, e quale con sembiante, e
quale con parole confortava il suo del suo amore."[154]
If he thus spent his time in play and love there can have been little
enough left, when the _Filocolo_ was laid aside, for study. We find
his father complaining of his slackness. Old Boccaccio had already
been grievously disappointed when Giovanni abandoned trade, and now
that he threw up or was not eager to pursue his law studies, he was
both distressed and angry; nor were Giovanni's friends more content.
All the Florentines at Naples, he tells us, seemed to speak with his
father's voice. It was well to be in love, they told him, even better
to write poetry, but to ruin oneself for love, _Monna mia!_ what
madness, and then poetry never made any one rich.[155]
So spoke and thought the practical Tuscan soul, and the English have
but echoed it for centuries. However, Giovanni only immersed himself
more in Ovid, and doubtless the throb of hexameter and pentameter
silenced the prose of the merchants. Later, about 1334, he began to
read Petrarch;[156] their personal friendship, however, did not
begin till much later, in 1350.[157] His reading then, like his love,
inspired him to write verses, and as he tells us, when the days of
uncertainty were over, "Under the new lordship of love I desired to
know what power splendid words had to move human hearts."[158] And
these _ornate parole_ were all in honour of his love. How he praises
her!
"Ed io presumo in versi diseguali
Di disegnarle in canto senza suono?
Vedete se son folli i pensier miei!"[159]
Presumptuous or no, he tells us very eloquently and sweetly that her
teeth were candid Eastern pearls, her lips, living rubies clear and
red, her cheeks, roses mixed with lilies, her hair, all gold like an
aureole about her happy face:--
"E l' altre parti tutte si confanno
Alle predette in proporzione eguale
Di costei ch' i ver angioli simiglia."[160]
And then her eyes, it is always them he praises best:--
"L' angelico leggiadro e dolce riso
Nel qual quando scintillan quelle stelle
Che la luce del ciel fanno minore
Par s' apra 'l cielo e rida il mundo tutto."[161]
But he speaks of her beauty in a thousand verses in a thousand
places, in many disguises.
This burning and eager love was, however, hindered in one thing--he
had the greatest difficulty in seeing Fiammetta:--
"Qualor mi mena Amor dov' io vi veggia
Ch' assai di rado avvien, sì cara sete...."[162]
For at this time certainly Fiammetta does not seem to have
considered his love of any importance to her, so that she gave him
very few opportunities of seeing her, and then in everything he had
to be careful not to rouse her husband's suspicions.[163] Sometimes,
too, she went far away into the country to some property of her
family, whither he could not follow, and always every year to Baia
for the season; so that we find him writing:--
"... colla bellezza sua mi spoglia
Ogn' anno nella più lieta stagione
Di quella donna ch' è sol mio desire;
A sè la chiama, ed io, contra mia voglia
Rimango senza il cuore, in gran quistione,
Qual men dorriemi il vivere o 'l morire."[164]
He managed to see her, however, sometimes in church, or at her
window, or in the gardens, and once he followed her to Baia, but only
to see her "a long way off." Yet, as he reminds himself, he always
had her, a vision in his heart:--
"Onde contra mia voglia, s' io non voglio
Lei riguardando, perder di vederla,
In altra parte mi convien voltare.
Oh grieve caso! ond' io forte mi doglio;
Colei qui cerco di poter vederla
Sempre non posso poi lei riguardare."[165]
Then there were moments of wild hope, till the indifference of
Fiammetta put it out; and he would resolve to break the "love
chains," but it was useless. He humiliated himself, and at last came
to despair. It was in some such moment, during her absence, we may
think, that he began the _Filostrato_,[166] and at length finally
abandoned those studies which in some sort his love had killed.
In this feverish state of mind, of soul, sometimes hopeful, sometimes
in despair, Boccaccio passed the next five years of his life, from
the spring of 1331 to the spring of 1336. It was during this time,
in 1335[167] it seems, that with his father's unwilling permission he
discontinued the law studies he had begun in 1329, but had for long
neglected, and gave himself up to literature, "without a master,"
but not without a counsellor--his old companion in the study of
astronomy, Calmeta. Other friends, too, were able to assist him,
among them Giovanni Barrili, the jurisconsult, a man of fine culture,
later Seneschal of King Robert for the kingdom of Provence,[168] and
Paolo da Perugia, King Robert's learned librarian, elected to that
office in 1332. Him Boccaccio held in the highest veneration, and no
doubt Paolo was very useful to him.[169]
We know nothing of his first literary studies, but we may be sure he
continued to read Ovid, and now read or re-read Virgil--these if only
for the study of versification. As for prose, it is possible that he
now read the _Metamorphoses_ of Apuleius, which he certainly knew and
admired. However that may be, his work at this time cannot have been
very severe or serious, for his mind was full of uneasiness about
Fiammetta, and this excitement no doubt increased in the early summer
of 1336, when she grew "kinder," and deigned even to encourage him;
he met her "con humil voce e con atti piacenti."[170]
[Illustration: MANLIUS THROWN INTO THE TIBER
_By the Dutch engraver called "The Master of the Subjects in the
Boccaccio." "De Casibus Virorum." (Strasburg, 1476.)_]
What was the real cause of this "kindness" it seems impossible we
should ever know. Perhaps at the moment Fiammetta lacked a lover,
though that is hard measure for her. Some cause there must have been,
for a woman does not surely let a lover sigh for five years unheard,
and then for no reason at all suddenly requite him. Certainly
Giovanni had made many beautiful verses for her, but when did that
touch a woman's heart? Yet, be the cause what it may, in the summer
of 1336 she would suddenly grow pale when he passed her by, and then
as suddenly turn her "starry eyes" on him languidly, voluptuously:--
"Amor, se questa donna non s' infinge
La mia speranza al suo termine viene...."
All this seems to have come to pass at Baia, perhaps, as Boccaccio
seems himself to suggest, one day in the woods of Monte Miseno
whither they were gone with a gay company holding festa there in
the golden spring weather.[171] And there were other days too: long
delicious noons in the woods, still evenings by the seashore, where,
though not alone, he might talk freely to her, by chance or strategy,
or in a low voice whisper his latest verses beating with her heart.
Giovanni, we may be sure, was no mean strategist; he was capable of
playing his part in the game of hide-and-seek with the world.[172]
He seems eagerly to have sought the friendship of her husband and
of her relations and Fiammetta herself tells us in the romance that
bears her name that filled "non solamente dello amoroso ardore, ma
ancora di cautela perfetta il vidi pieno; il che sommamente mi fu a
grado. Esso, con intera considerazione vago di servare il mio onore e
adempiere, quando i luoghi e li tempi il concedessero, li suoi desii
credo non senza gravissima pena, usando molte arti, s' ingegnò d'
aver la familiarità di qualunque mi era parente, ed ultimamente del
mio marito: la quale non solamente ebbe, ma ancora con tanta grazia
la possedette, che a niuno niuna cosa era a grado, se non tanto
quanto con lui la comunicava...."[173]
Well, the one hundred and thirty-five days had begun.[174] There
were difficulties still to be overcome, however, before he won that
for which, as he says, he had always begged. Fiammetta, like a very
woman, denied it him over and over again, though very willingly she
would have given it to him. Expert as he had become in a woman's
heart--in this woman's heart at least--Giovanni guessed all this
and knew besides that she could not give him what he desired unless
he took it with a show at least of violence. Such, even to-day, are
Italian manners.[175] He awaited the opportunity. It seems to have
come during the absence of the husband in Capua.[176] Screwing his
courage to the sticking-point, he resolved to go to her chamber, and
to this end persuaded or bribed her maid to help him.[177]
It was in the early days of November probably, days so pensive in
that beautiful southern country, that it befell even as he had
planned. Led by the maid into Fiammetta's chamber, he hid himself
behind the curtains of the great marital bed. Presently she came
in with the maid, who undressed her and put her to bed, and left
her, half laughing, half in tears. Again he waited, and when at
last, desperate with anxiety and hope, he dared to come out of his
hiding, she was sleeping as quietly as a child. For a time he looked
at her, then trembling and scarce daring to breathe the while, he
crept into the great bed beside her, in verity as though he were her
newly wedded husband. Then softly he kissed her, sleeping still, and
drawing aside the curtain that hid the light,[178] discovered to his
amorous eyes "il delicato petto, e con desiderosa mano toccava le
ritonde mammelle, bacciandola molte volte," and already held her in
his arms when she awakened. She opened her mouth to cry for help, he
closed it with kisses; she strove to get out of bed, but he held her
firm, bidding her have no fear. She was defeated, of course, but that
her yielding might not seem too easy she reproached him[179] in a
trembling voice--trembling with fear and pleasure--for the violence
with which he had stolen what she had always denied him; adding that
all was quite useless as she did not wish it.
Then Giovanni, putting all to the proof, drew a dagger from his
belt, and retiring to a corner of the bed, in a low and distressed
voice said--we find the words in the _Ameto_--"I come not, O lady,
to defile the chastity of thy bed, but as an ardent lover to obtain
relief for my burning desires; thou alone canst assuage them, or tell
me to die: surely I will only leave thee satisfied or dead, not that
I seek to gratify my passion by violence or to compel any to raise
cruel hands against me; but if thou art deaf to my entreaties with my
dagger I shall pierce my heart."
To kill himself--there. O no, Giovanni! Certainly she did not want
that. What then? Well, not a dead man in her room, at any rate, for
all the world to talk about.[180] Yes, she was paid in her own coin.
She was conquered; her silence gave consent. "O no, Giovanni!"
"Donna mia," he whispered, "I came thus because it was pleasing to
the gods...."[181]
"Thou lovest me so?" she answered. "And when then, and how, and why
... and why?" So he told her all over again from the beginning, and
she, yielding little by little, seemed doubtful even yet. Then he
asked again, "Che farò O Donna? Passerà il freddo ferro il solecito
petto o lieto sarà dal tuo riscaldato?" At this renewed menace the
poor lady, without more ado, reached for the iron and flung it away.
Then he, putting his arms about her and kissing her furiously,
whispered: "Lady, the gods, my passion, and thy beauty, have wounded
my soul, and thus as was already told thee in dreams I shall for
ever be thine: I do not think I need implore thee to be mine, but if
necessary I pray thee now once for all...."
That night was but the first of a long series, as we may suppose.
"Oh," says Fiammetta, in the romance which bears her name, "how he
loved my room and with what joy it saw him arrive. He held it in
greater reverence than any church (temple). Ah me, what pleasant
kisses! What loving embraces! How many nights passed as though they
had been bright days in sweet converse without sleep! How many
delights, dear to every lover, have we enjoyed there in those happy
days."[182]
So autumn passed into winter and the long nights grew short, and
all the world was at the spring; and for them too it was the golden
age--so long ago. Well, do we not know how they spent their lives?
It was ever Giovanni's way to kiss and tell. Has he not spoken of
the festas and the jousts, and the rare encounters that in Naples
greeted Primavera?[183] We see him with Fiammetta at the Courts of
Love, in the deep shade of the gardens, in the joyful fields,[184]
on the seashore at Baia,[185] and at the Bagno beside the lake of
Avernus,[186] while we may catch a glimpse of them too at a wedding
feast.[187] So passed what proved to be the one happy year of their
love, and perhaps the happiest of Giovanni's life.
* * * * *
That year so full of wild joy soon passed away. With the dawn of
1338 his troubles began. At first jealousy. He found it waiting to
torture him on returning from a journey we know not whither,[188] in
which he had encountered dangers by flood and field; a winter journey
then, doubtless. He came home to find Fiammetta disdainful, angry,
even indifferent. All the annoyance of the road came back to him
threefold:--[189]
"... non ch' alcun tormento
Mi desser tornand 'io, ma fur gioconde,
Tanta dolce speranza mi recava
Spronato dal desio di rivederti,
Qual ver me ti lasciai, Donna, pietosa.
Or, oltre, a quel che io, lasso! stimava,
Trovo mi sdegni, e non so per quai merti;
Per che piange nel cor l' alma dogliosa,
E maledico i monti, l' alpe e 'l mare,
Che mai mi ci lasciaron ritornare."[190]
Whose fault was it? Perhaps there is not much need to ask. Fiammetta
was incapable of any stability in love, and Giovanni could never
help looking at "altre donne."[191] As we have seen, Fiammetta was
surrounded by admirers who were not, be sure, more scrupulous than
Boccaccio. So that his suspicions were aroused, and he must have
found it difficult to obey her when she forbade him to follow her
to Baia in 1338. Perhaps he had compromised her, and for that cause
alone she had ceased to care for him--it would perhaps be after her
nature; but however it may have been, it was no marvel that he was
jealous, angry, and afraid.[192]
[Illustration: ALLEGORY OF WEALTH AND POVERTY
_From a miniature in the French version of the "De Casibus Virorum,"
made in 1409 by Laurent le Premierfait. MS. Late XV century. (Brit.
Mus. Rothschild Bequest. MS. XII.)_]
And his fears prophesied truly--he was betrayed. He did not know it
when she first returned to Naples after the summer was gone. She took
care of that,[193] but she gave him excuses instead of kisses,
which only roused his angry jealousy the more. "Il geloso," she told
him, "ha l' animo pieno d' infinite sollecitudini, alle quali nè
speranza nè altro diletto può porgere conforto o alleviare la sua
pena.... Egli vuole e s' ingegna di porre legge a' piedi e alle mani,
e a ogni altro atto della sua donna,"[194] and so on and so forth.
These hypocritical and eloquent commonplaces did not soothe him, but
rather increased his anxiety. We must remember that though Giovanni
would gad after other beauties, he loved Fiammetta then and always.
It is not surprising, then, that his jealousy became a wild anger.
"Nel cuore mi s' accese un' ira sì ferocissima, che quasi con lei non
mi fece allora crucciare, ma pur mi ritenni."[195] Little by little
suspicion grew to certainty; he guessed he was betrayed, he knew it,
he suspected the very man, his supplanter, his friend; and he sees
him, as it were in a dream, on the "montagne vicine a Pompeano," like
a great mastiff who devours the hen pheasant at a mouthful.[196] What
could he do, what could he say? "Let Thy name perish, Baia...."
"Perir possa il tuo nome, Baia, e il loco;
Boschi selvaggi le tue piagge sieno,
E le tue fonti diventin veneno,
Nè vi si bagni alcun molto nè poco:
In pianto si converta ogni tuo gioco,
E suspetto diventi il tuo bel seno
A' naviganti; il nuvolo e 'l sereno
In te riversin fumo solfo e fuoco;
Che hai corrotto la più casta mente
Che fosse in donna colla tua licenza,
Se il ver mi disser gli occhi non è guari.
Là onde io sempre viverò dolente,
Come ingannato da folle credenza;
Or fuss' io stato cieco non ha guari!"[197]
After rage, humiliation. He tells himself that in spite of all he
will love her always, more and more, yes, more than his own life or
honour. He will persist, he will not be easily beaten, he will regain
her. And yet it is all quite useless, as he knows.[198] Was it not in
this hour that he wrote the following beautiful lines:--
"La lagrime e i sospiri e 'l non sperare,
A quella fine m' han si sbigottito
Ch' io me ne vo per via com' uom smarrito:
Non so che dire e molto men che fare.
E quando avvien che talor ragionare
Oda di me, che n' ho talvolta udito,
Del pallido colore, e del partito
Vigore, e del dolor che di fuor pare,
Una pietà di me stesso mi vene
Sì grande, ch' io desio di dir piangendo
Che sia cagion di tanto mio martiro:
Ma poi, temendo non aggiugner pene
Alle mie noie, tanto mi difendo,
Ch' io passo in compagnia d' alcun sospiro."[199]
But fate was not content, as he himself says,[200] with this single
blow. Till now he had wanted for nothing; he had had a home of his
own, and had been able to go to court when, and as, he would, and
to enter fully into the life of the gay city. Now suddenly poverty
stared him in the face. His father, from whom all that was stable
and good in his life hitherto had proceeded, was ruined.[201] But
even in his fall he remembered his son, and though Giovanni was
now twenty-five years of age, he maintained him, at considerable
inconvenience doubtless, from 1st November, 1338, to 1st November,
1339, by buying for him the produce of a _podere_ near Capua, "i beni
della chiesa di S. Lorenzo dell' Arcivescovato di Capua," which cost
him twenty-six florins.[202] Della Torre thinks that the wretched
youth was compelled to visit the place (possibly this was his fateful
journey) and to deal with a _fattore di campagna_ and the wily
_contadini_ of whom Alberti has so much to tell us a century later.
With them he would have to take account of the grain, the grapes, the
olives, the swine, and so forth, while trying to write romances and
to save his love from utter disaster.
As though the ills he suffered were not enough, it was at this time
he lost a friend and protector from whom he expected very much.
Niccolò Acciaiuoli, whom he had known since 1331, left Naples on 10th
October, 1338, and two years later Boccaccio writes to him on his
return from the Morea: "Nicola, if any trust can be placed in the
miserable, I swear to you by my suffering soul that the departure of
Trojan Æneas was not a deeper sorrow to the Carthaginian Dido than
was yours to me: not without reason, though you knew it not: nor
did Penelope long for the return of Ulysses more than I longed for
yours."[203]
And then all his companions forsook him owing to his change of
fortune; one by one they fell away. He who had consorted with nobles
and loved a king's daughter was left alone; not in his own dwelling,
but outside the city now, "sub Monte Falerno apud busta Maronis," as
he dates his letters: close then to the tomb of Virgil. Was it now,
at the lowest ebb of his fortunes, in all this tempest of ill, that
he turned to the verse of the Mantuan who has healed so many wounds
that the Church may not touch; and so, dreaming beside his sepulchre
at Posilippo, remembering the wasted life, the irrecoverable years,
made that vow which posterity has so well remembered, sworn as it was
on Virgil's grave, to give himself to letters, to follow his art for
ever?
Henceforth his life belongs to literature. "Every cloud," says the
proverb, "has a silver lining," and the miseries of youth, though
not the least bitter, differ, in this at least, from those of old
age, that one has time to profit by them. So it was with Giovanni.
The tempest which had destroyed so much that he valued most highly
was in some sort his salvation. To love is good, they had told him,
to write verses even better; but to ruin oneself for love----! What
madness! Yet it was just that he had done, and like many others who
have practised his art, he found in ruin the highway of the world.
Driven by poverty outside the city, deprived alike of its pleasures
and the excitement and distractions of his love, he had nothing left
but his art, and for the first time in his life he seems to have set
himself to study and to practise it with all his might. Deserted
by his companions, he reminded himself that he was a poet and that
solitude was his friend. He seems to have read much, studying in the
shadow of Virgil's tomb the works of that poet[204] and the writings
of the ever-delightful Apuleius, while in the letter to Calmeta we
find--and this is most interesting in regard to his own work--that he
was already reading the _Thebais_ of Statius.[205] Helpers, too, of
a sort he had, among them Dionigi Roberti da Borgo Sansepolcro,[206]
who, as Della Torre thinks, made him write to Petrarch, a thing
Boccaccio no doubt had long wished, but hesitated, to do. The first
extant communication between them, however, dates from 1349.
In the midst of this resurrection of energy in which, as we learn,
he had already grown calm enough to see _Fiammetta_ afar off without
flinching and even with a sort of pleasure, his father, widowed by
the death of Margherita, "full of years, deprived by death of his
children," summoned him home.[207] When did Boccaccio obey this
summons? That he was in Naples in 1340 is proved by the letter "Sacro
famis et angelice viro," dated "sub Monte Falerno apud busta Maronis
Virgilii, Julii Kal IIII.," i.e. 28th June, and, as the contents
show, of the year 1340.[208] He was still there in October, for
on 1st November the renewal of the contract of the _podere_ of S.
Lorenzo fell due, but by 11th January, 1341, we know him to have been
in Florence.[209] He left Naples, then, between 1st November, 1340,
and 11th January, 1341,[210] and as the journey took eleven days or
so he must have set out in the end of the year. By so doing, as it
happened, he just missed seeing Petrarch, who, invited to his court
by King Robert, left Avignon on 16th February, 1341, in the company
of Azzo da Correggio, to reach Naples in March.[211]
So Giovanni came back into the delicate and strong Florentine
country, along the bad roads, through the short days, the whole world
lost in wind and rain, neither glad nor sorry, but thoughtful, and,
yes, homesick after all for that ghost in his heart.
FOOTNOTES:
[146] And such was the fashion.
[147] DELLA TORRE, _op. cit._, p. 213.
[148] _Fiammetta_, _ed. cit._, pp. 63-4.
[149] I give the Italian, my translation being somewhat free:--"Un
piccolo libretto, volgarmente parlando, nel quale il nascimento, lo
innamoramento, e gli accidenti delli detti due infino alla lor fine
interamente si contenga.... Io sentendo la dolcezza delle parole
procedenti dalla graziosa bocca _e pensando che mai, cioè infino a
questo giorno, di niuna cosa era stato dalla nobil donna pregato, il
suo prego in luogo di comandamento mi reputai, prendendo per quello
migliore speranza nel futuro de' miei disii_."
[150] In the _Amorosa Visione_ we learn that she told him no longer
to make fun of himself and to think no more of the social difference
between them. In the _Filocolo_ he tells us that he first began to
hope after this interview. No doubt she wished to play with him as
with the rest. Certainly he was not easy in his mind. "Quelle parole
più paura d' inganno che speranza di futuro frutto mi porsero," he
tells us in the _Filocolo_, _ed. cit._, II., p. 248. Then come the
words I for one find so suspicious concerning his birth. In order,
he says, to bring her nearer to him, he thinks of his birth which,
different in social position as they are, was not unlike hers in
its romance. His mother was noble, he tells her, and he feels this
nobility in his heart. "Ma la nobilità del mio cuore tratta non
dal pastor padre, ma dalla reale madre mi porse ardire e dissi:
'Seguirolla e proverò se vera sarà nell' effetto come nel parlar si
mostra volonterosa."
[151] _Filocolo_, _ed. cit._, II, 86.
[152] See on this subject DE BLASIIS, _Le Case de' Principi Angioni_
in _Arch. St. per le prov. nap._, Ann. XII, pp. 311-12.
[153] _Fiammetta_, _ed. cit._, p. 84. I translate: "A city more
addicted to joyous festivals than any other in Italy, her citizens
were not only entertained with marriages, or country amusements, or
with boat-races, but abounding in perpetual festivities she diverted
her inhabitants now with one thing, now with another; among others
she shone supreme in the frequent tournaments."
[154] _Fiammetta_, _ed. cit._, pp. 119-20. "The youths when jousting
with potent weapons on galloping horses or to the sound of clashing
bells in miniature warfare, showed joyously how with a light hand on
the foam-covered bridle fiery horses were to be managed. The young
women delighting in these things, garlanded with spring flowers,
either from high windows or from the doors below, glanced gaily at
their lovers; one with a new gift, another with tender looks, yet
another with soft words assured her servant of her love."
[155] Cf. _De Genealogiis_, XIV, 4, and XV, 10. Giovanni's reply will
be found in the _Filocolo_, _ed. cit._, II, pp. 84-6, "Chi mosse
Vergilio? Chi Ovidio? Chi gli altri poeti a lasciare di loro eterna
fama ne' santi versi, li quali mai ai nostri orecchi pervenuti non
sarieno se costui non fosse?" and so forth.
[156] So it seems we ought to understand his letter to Franceschino
da Brossano, where he says: "Et ego quadraginta annis, vel amplius
suis (that is, of Petrarch) fui" (CORAZZINI, _op. cit._, p. 382).
[157] "Sono quarant' anni," he writes in 1374, "e più che io amo
ed onoro il Petrarca"; cf. DOBELLI and MANICARDI AND MASSERA:
_Introduzione al testo critico del "Canzoniere" del Boccaccio_
(Castel Fiorentino, 1901), pp. 62-4.
[158] _Filocolo_, _ed. cit._, II, p. 248.
[159] _Rime_ (Moutier), XVIII.
[160] _Ibid._, III.
[161] _Ibid._, LXXXIX.
[162] _Ibid._, LXXXIII.
[163] _Fiammetta_, _ed. cit._, p. 28.
[164] _Rime_ (Moutier), XXXIV.
[165] _Ibid._, XXV.
[166] Cf. CRESCINI, _op. cit._, pp. 186-208; DELLA TORRE, _op. cit._,
p. 245.
[167] See DELLA TORRE, _op. cit._, pp. 259 and 260. Cf. also
_De Genealogiis_, Lib. XV, cap. x (HECKER, _Boccaccio Funde_,
Braunschweig, 1902, p. 289). "Attamen jam fere maturus etate et mei
juris factus, nemine impellente, nemine docente, imo obsistente patre
et studium tale damnante, quod modicum novi poetice, sua sponte
sumpsit ingenium eamque summa aviditate secutus sum, et, precipua cum
delectatione, auctorum eiusdem libros vidi legique, et, uti potui,
intelligere conatus sum." So he seems to have won over his father by
telling him he was of an age to decide for himself.
[168] See ZENATI, _Dante e Firenze_ (Firenze, 1903), p. 251, note 1,
and the works there cited. FARAGLIA, _Barbato di Sulmona e gli uomini
di lettere della corte di Roberto d' Angiò_ in _Arch. St. It._,
Ser. V, Vol. III, p. 343. IDEM: _I due amici del Petrarca, Giovanni
Barrili e Barbato di Sulmona_ in _I miei studi storici delle cose
abruzzesi_ (Rocca Carabba, 1893), and DELLA TORRE, _op. cit._, p. 261
_et seq._
[169] Cf. ZENATI, _op. cit._, p. 275, note 1.
[170] See MANICARDI MASSERA, _op. cit._, p. 71, note 1, and DELLA
TORRE, _op. cit._, p. 262.
[171] Boccaccio praises especially Monte Miseno in Sonnet xlviii.:--
"Ben lo so io, che in te ogni mia noia
Lasciai, e femmi d' allegrezza pieno
Colui ch' è sire e re d' ogni mia gloria";
and even more especially in Sonnet xlvii., where he speaks of it:--
"Nelle quai si benigno Amor trovai
Che refrigerio diede a' miei ardori
E ad ogni mia noia pose freno."
But see also ANTONA TRAVERSI, _Della realtà dell' amore di Boccaccio_
in _Propugnatore_ (1883-4), Vols. XVI and XVII, and in _Rivista
Europea_ (1882-3), Vols. XXIX and XXXI.
[172] As to his strategy, hear him in the _Fiammetta_: "Quante volte
già in mia presenza e de' miei più cari, caldo di festa e di cibi
e di amore, fignendo Fiammetta e Panfilo essere stati greci, narrò
egli come io di lui, ed esso di me, primamente stati eravamo presi,
con quanti accidenti poi n' erano seguitati, alli luoghi ed alle
persone pertinenti alla novella dando convenevoli nomi! Certo io ne
risi più volte, e non meno della sua sagacità che della semplicità
delli ascoltanti; e talvolta fu che io temetti, che troppo caldo non
trasportasse la lingua disavvendutamente dove essa andare non doveva;
ma egli, più savio che io non pensava, astutissimamente si guardava
dal falso latino...." Maria was doubtless a good scholar, already very
proficient.
[173] _Fiammetta_, _ed. cit._, p. 37 _et seq._; cf. CRESCINI,
_op. cit._, pp. 151-2. I translate: "filled not only with amorous
ardour, but also with infinite caution, which pleased me mightily,
desirous above all things to shield my honour and yet to attain
whenever possible his desire, not, I think, without much trouble,
he used every art and studied how to gain the friendship, first of
any who were related to me, and then of my husband: in this he was
so successful that he entirely won their good graces, and nothing
pleased them but what was shared by him."
[174] See _supra_, p. 40.
[175] On this point see an incident related by LINA DUFF GORDON in
her charming _Home Life in Italy_ (Methuen, 1908), p. 157.
[176] See _Ameto_, _ed. cit._, p. 224 _et seq._; cf. CRESCINI, _op.
cit._, pp. 80-2, and DELLA TORRE, _op. cit._, p. 270.
[177] For all these particulars and the following see _Filocolo_,
_ed. cit._, II, pp. 168-9, 174, 178-9. Without doubt these passages
are biographical. See CRESCINI, _op. cit._, p. 82, and DELLA TORRE,
p. 270 _et seq._
[178] Fiammetta was afraid of the dark since her childhood; she
always had a light in her room. Cf. _Fiammetta_, _ed. cit._, p. 55.
[179] "Col tuo ardito ingegno, me presa nella tacita notte secura
dormendo ... prima nelle braccia m' avesti e quasi la mia pudicizia
violata, che io fossi dal sonno interamente sviluppata. E che doveva
io fare, questo veggendo? doveva io gridare, e col mio grido a me
infamia perpetua, ed a te, il quale io più che me medesima amava,
morte cercare?"--_Fiammetta_, _ed. cit._; p. 67. Not so argued
"Lucrece of Rome town."
[180] It was a cowardly threat from our point of view, but probably
not an idle one. Men go to bed in Sicily and die of love in the
night. And then, too, this violence was part of the etiquette, and in
some sort is so still, in Southern Italy, at any rate.
[181] _Filocolo_, _ed. cit._, II, p. 180. In the _Ameto_, _ed. cit._,
p. 225, he says it was Hecate who brought him in.
[182] _Fiammetta_, _ed. cit._, p. 39.
[183] Cf. _Fiammetta_, _ed. cit._, pp. 84-8.
[184] _Filocolo_, _ed. cit._, II, p. 27 _et seq._; cf. also DELLA
TORRE, _St. della Accademia Platonica di Firenze_ (Firenze, 1902),
p. 164 _et seq._; and PIO RAJNA, _L' Episodio delle Questioni d'
amore nel "Filocolo"_ in _Raccolta di studi critici per A. d' Ancona_
(Firenze, 1901).
[185] Sonnet xxxii., _Rime_, _ed. cit._
[186] Cf. HORTIS, _Accenni alle Scienze naturali nelle opere di
G. B._ (Trieste, 1877), p. 49 _et seq._; and PERCOPÒ, _I bagni di
Pozzuoli_ in _Arch. St. per le prov. nap._, XI, pp. 668, 703-4.
[187] _Fiammetta_, pp. 77-80.
[188] Cf. CRESCINI, _op. cit._, p. 182, note 1.
[189] Cf. DELLA TORRE, _op. cit._, p. 289.
[190] Sonnet lix., _Rime_, _ed. cit._
[191] See Madrigal ii. (Moutier) and Sonnet xxiv. (Moutier), where
he excuses himself. As for Fiammetta, we know her, and she says,
in the _Fiammetta_, "Quanti e quali giovani d' avere il mio amore
tentassero, e i diversi modi, e l' inghirlandate porte dagli loro
amori, le notturne risse e le diurne prodezze per quelli operate."
In the _Filocolo_ he describes how in a vision Florio is shown how
strenuously he ought to defend his love from her admirers.
[192] See Sonnet lxix., in which he says (but see the whole sonnet):--
"Ed io lo so, e di quinci ho temenza,
Non con la donna mia si fatti sienvi,
Che 'l petto l' aprano ed entrinsi in quello."
[193] _Filocolo_, _ed. cit._, II, p. 70-1; CRESCINI, _op. cit._, pp.
76-7: DELLA TORRE, _op. cit._, pp. 294-5.
[194] I translate: "The jealous lover's soul is ever filled with
infinite terrors and his pangs are not to be alleviated by hope or
by any other joy. He insists on inventing and dictating laws for the
feet and hands, and for every act of his mistress."--_Filocolo_, _ed.
cit._, II, p. 73.
[195] _Filocolo_, _ed. cit._, II, p. 71. I translate: "My heart was
filled with such furious anger that I almost broke away from her, yet
I restrained myself."
[196] _Filocolo_, _ed. cit._, II, pp. 25-6.
[197] Sonnet iv.; cf. also Sonnet lv. "Che dolore intollerabile
sostengo," he writes in the _Filocolo_. See also Madrigal iii., and
DELLA TORRE, _op. cit._, pp. 297-9.
[198] Cf. _Filocolo_, _ed. cit._, II, p. 262. "Come di altri molti,"
he says, "avea fatto, cosi di lui feci gittandolo dal mio senno.
Questa cosa fatta, la costui letizia si rivolse in pianto. E,
brevemente, egli in poco tempo di tanta pietà il suo viso dipinse,
che egli in compassione di sè moveva i più ignoti. Egli mi si
mostrava, e con preghi e con lagrime tanto umile quanto più poteva,
la mia grazia ricercando...."
[199] Sonnet lxxxvii.
[200] _Filocolo_, _ed. cit._, II, 26.
[201] We know nothing of the cause of Boccaccino's ruin. It is
interesting to remember, however, that he was connected with the
Bardi who in 1339 had, with the Peruzzi, lent Edward III of England
1,075,000 florins. As we know, this sum was never repaid, and the
transaction ruined the lenders. Boccaccino himself seems to have been
already short of money in 1336, when he sold Casa di Boccaccio.
[202] The church is situated, according to Della Torre, in the
village of S. Maria Maggiore. See DELLA TORRE, _op. cit._, pp. 309-13.
[203] CORAZZINI, _op. cit._, p. 17.
[204] That Boccaccio considered Virgil in some sort a magician is
certain. Cf. HORTIS, _Studi_, etc., pp. 394, 396-8.
[205] Not being able to understand it, he asks for an example with
glosses. Cf. CORAZZINI, _op. cit._, p. 465.
[206] Cf. the letter to Niccolò Acciaiuoli, dated from Florence,
August 23, 1341, where he speaks of "il reverendo mio padre e
signore, Maestro Dionigi," CORAZZINI, _op. cit._, p. 18. Possibly
Dionigi made him read Seneca. Cf. DELLA TORRE, _op. cit._, pp. 323-4.
[207] Boccaccino had lost almost everything, including the _dote_
of his wife. Giovanni declares this was the justice of heaven upon
him for the desertion of his (Giovanni's) mother. Cf. _Ameto_, _ed.
cit._, pp. 187-8. He never forgave his father for this. Yet, like a
good son, he obeyed the summons, and says later that "we ought to
learn to bear the yoke of our fathers, and should honour with the
greatest reverence their trembling old age." We believe Margherita
died in 1339. The last document we have which speaks of her is,
however, of 1337. When Francesco died we cannot say.
[208] Cf. DELLA TORRE, _op. cit._, p. 339. This letter is, as I have
already said, considered apocryphal by many scholars, though not by
Della Torre.
[209] _Ibid._, p. 343. See document there given, which equally proves
that on 11th January, 1341, Boccaccio was already in Florence.
[210] _Fiammetta_, _ed. cit._, p. 40, where he says Panfilo (himself)
left Naples "essendo il tempo per piove e per freddo noioso."
[211] Della Torre seems to have proved that Boccaccio left Naples
in December, 1340, and was in Florence early in the new year, 1341.
For the most part he is in agreement with Crescini and Landau. Cf.
CRESCINI, _op. cit._, p. 86 _et seq._, and LANDAU, _op. cit._, 70 and
40 (Italian edition) also pp. 181-2. KOERTING, _op. cit._, p. 164,
says 1339 or 1340.