Summary: Preface & Introduction 

In the Preface, Boccaccio directly addresses his readers, who are noble ladies, and explains his reasons for writing about love. Boccaccio has recently recovered from a love affair. Now that he is well again, he feels qualified to offer solace to those who are still suffering.

In the Introduction, Boccaccio sets the scene for the book. In 1348, a terrible plague sweeps into the city of Florence. The disease causes swellings in the groin or armpit, followed by dark blotches all over the body. Few people recover from the pestilence. Most die within three days. The disease is so widespread that healthy people avoid the sick, leaving them to die alone. Servants desert their masters, and some parents abandon their children. Corpses pile up in houses and on the streets. Funeral customs are ignored because there are not enough priests to conduct services and there is not enough holy ground on which to bury the dead. Mass burials are common.

People who are still alive and well deal with the appalling evil of the plague in various ways. Some people live quietly apart from society. Others visit the taverns, finding pleasure while they still can. All respect for the law, both divine and human-made, has broken down, and people do what they please. Some attempt to escape the plague by fleeing to country estates, but the plague afflicts the countryside as well.

Amid all this misery, ten young people meet in a church and decide their future. First to arrive are seven young women: Pampinea, Fiammetta, Filomena, Emilia, Lauretta, Neifile, and Elissa. After attending the service, the women discuss the perils of their times. Pampinea proposes that they all move together to the country to wait out the plague. The other ladies applaud the idea. Three young men enter the church: Panfilo, Filostrato, and Dioneo. All three are in love with or related to women in the group. Pampinea asks the men to retreat to the country with them in a spirit of comradeship. The men agree that their behavior will be refined and chaste.

The group sets off the next morning, accompanied by a few servants. They reach a beautiful palace about two miles outside the city. The palace is surrounded by delectable gardens and meadows and has a cellar stocked with fine food and wine. The bedrooms are freshly made up with flowers in all the rooms. The young people vow to leave their troubles back in the city.

Pampinea proposes that they choose a new ruler every day, who will decide that day’s entertainment. Everyone votes to make Pampinea the first queen. She begins her reign by assigning the household tasks. She appoints Dioneo’s manservant, Parmeno, as steward. Sirisco, Panfilo’s servant, is to serve as treasurer and buyer. Tindaro, Filostrato’s servant, will wait on all three gentlemen. Pampinea’s maid Misia and Filomena’s maid Licisca will run the kitchen. Chimera and Stratilia, the maids of Lauretta and Fiammetta, will wait on all the ladies. Pampinea instructs the servants to speak only of happy things.

After a delicious meal, the young people entertain each other with music and dancing. After resting during the hottest part of the day, they walk to a lush meadow and sit in a circle on the green grass. Pampinea suggests that they gather in this spot each late afternoon to tell one another stories. Everyone agrees.

Analysis: Preface & Introduction

In the Preface, Boccaccio addresses his readers directly. He makes two assumptions: that his readers are female and that females are primarily interested in love stories. The Preface is Boccaccio’s opportunity to state the main theme of the book: love. In the Introduction, Boccaccio sets the scene for telling the stories.

The epidemic that sweeps through Florence in 1348 provides the setting and frame for The Decameron as well as the dark background that accentuates the light tone of the stories. Boccaccio describes the epidemic with many graphic details that dwell on the high level of human suffering and the breakdown of family ties and public order that the plague brings. (In fact, Boccaccio’s description is the best-known eyewitness account of the Great Plague of the fourteenth century.) The evils of the plague drive the ten young characters out of Florence to a palace in the countryside. The young people enjoy the love and pleasure of living in the country, and they vow to speak only of happy things, but the misery and death they have recently experienced are always still with them. As the characters dance and sing, the reader might recall that they have recently been weeping and burying their dead.

This frame story of The Decameron celebrates the beauty of nature and praises the simple country life. It takes place in an idyllic setting, a fantasy world completely cut off from harsh human reality. When Pampinea forbids the servants from talking about anything but good news, she tries to create an idealized world, a paradise on earth. Pampinea’s paradise is the opposite of the hell she has left behind. Back in the afflicted city of Florence, servants desert their masters. Here in her paradise, Pampinea can commandeer seven faithful helpers who perform their work to perfection.

The Introduction sets out the major themes of The Decameron, such as the power of love, the duality of fortune, the virtue of intelligence, the hypocrisy of holiness, and the folly of vice. Boccaccio and his characters handle these themes in a manner that is both medieval and modern. For example, the characters attend religious services, but they do not hesitate to criticize the clergy. The women expect to have traditional roles in matters of love and marriage, but they also assert their power.

In the Introduction, Boccaccio names the characters and provides hints about them, a tactic he will use throughout the book. Pampinea, the oldest woman, is the instigator of the retreat and the natural leader of the young people. By making Pampinea a relative of one of the young men, Boccaccio hints that she is looking out for her family’s interests. Pampinea appoints Dioneo’s manservant, Parmeno, as steward, a hint that she and Dioneo might have a family connection or that she is otherwise close to Dioneo.

Pampinea’s proposal for storytelling provides the structure for The Decameron as a whole. The structure is based on numbers (like many works of scholarly medieval literature were), a structure that supposedly reflects divine order. Boccaccio provides ten characters (three men and seven women) and seven servants. Each character in turn provides ten stories, one a day for ten days, for one hundred stories in all. Pampinea’s proposal also determines the structure of each day of the rural retreat. The young people create a well-ordered world to counter the disorder and chaos of the plague.