Volume 1

The Decameron of Giovanni Boccaccio / faithfully translated by J.M. Rigg ; with illustrations by Louis Chalon.

  • Giovanni Boccaccio
Date:
1903
Catalogue details

Licence: Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0)

Credit: The Decameron of Giovanni Boccaccio / faithfully translated by J.M. Rigg ; with illustrations by Louis Chalon. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    sick, and to watch them die ; in which Service they themselves not seldom perished with their gains. In consequence of which dearth of servants and dereliction of thè sick by neighbours, kinsfolk and friends, it carne to pass—a thing, perhaps, never before heard of— that no woman, however dainty, fair or well-born she might be, shrank, when stricken with thè disease, from thè ministrations of a man, no matter whether he were young or no, or scrupled to expose to him every part of her body, with no more shame than if he had been a woman, submitting of necessity to that which her malady required ; wherefrom, perchance, there resulted in after time some loss of modesty in such as recovered. Besides which many suc- cumbed, who with proper attendance, would, perhaps, bave escaped death ; so that, what with thè virulence of thè plague and thè lack of due tendance of thè sick, thè multitude of thè deaths, that daily and nightly took place in thè city, was such that those who heard thè tale—not to say witnessed thè fact—were struck dumb with amazement. Whereby, practices contrary to thè former habits of thè citizens could hardly fail to grow up among thè survivors. It had been, as to-day it stili is, thè custom for thè women that were neighbours and of kin to thè deceased to gather in his house with thè women that were most closely connected with him, to wail with them in common, while on thè other hand his male kins- folk and neighbours, with not a few of thè other citizens, and a due proportion of thè clergy according to his quality, assembled without, in front of thè house, to receive thè corpse ; and so thè dead man was borne on thè shoulders of his peers, with funeral pomp of taper and dirge, to thè church selected by him before his death. Which rites, as thè pestilence waxed in fury, were either in whole or in great part disused, and gave way to others of a novel order. For not only did no crowd of women surround thè bed of thè dying, but many passed from this life unregarded, and few indeed were they to whom were accorded thè lamentations and bitter tears of sorrowing relations ; nay, for thè most part, their place was taken by thè laugh, thè jest, thè festal gathering ; observances which thè women, domes- tic piety in large measure set aside, had adopted with very great advantage to their health. Few also there were whose bodies were attended to thè church by more than ten or twelvc of their neigh- bours, and those not thè honourable and respected citizens ; but a sort
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