Source 11.2
Like Ibn al-
Questions to consider as you examine the source:
Giovanni Boccaccio
The Decameron, Mid-
[In 1348] into the distinguished city of Florence . . . there came a deadly pestilence. . . .
Neither a doctor’s advice nor the strength of medicine could do anything to cure this illness; . . . in fact, the number of doctors, other than the well-
There came about such a fear and such fantastic notions among those who remained alive that almost all of them took a very cruel attitude in the matter; that is, they completely avoided the sick and their possessions, and in so doing, each one believed that he was protecting his own good health.
There were some people who thought that living moderately and avoiding any excess might help a great deal in resisting this disease, and so they gathered in small groups and lived entirely apart from everyone else. . . .
Others thought the opposite: they believed that drinking excessively, enjoying life, going about singing and celebrating, satisfying in every way the appetites as best one could, laughing and making light of everything that happened was the best medicine for such a disease; so they practiced to the fullest what they believed by going from one tavern to another all day and night, drinking to excess; and they would often make merry in private homes, doing everything that pleased or amused them the most. This they were able to do easily for everyone felt he was doomed to die and as a result abandoned his property, so that most of the houses had become common property, and any stranger who came upon them used them as if he were their rightful owner. . . .
And in this great affliction and misery of our city the revered authority of the laws, both divine and human, had fallen and almost completely disappeared, for, like other men, the ministers and executors of the laws were either dead or sick. . . .
Others . . . maintained that there was no better medicine against the plague than to flee from it. . . .
When a woman fell sick, no matter how attractive or beautiful or noble she might be, she did not mind having a manservant (whoever he might be, no matter how young or old he was), and she had no shame whatsoever in revealing any part of her body to him . . . when necessity of her sickness required her to do so. This practice was, perhaps, in the days that followed the pestilence, the cause of looser morals in the women who survived the plague. . . .
With the fury of the pestilence increasing, [traditional burial customs] for the most part died out and other practices took [their] place . . . so not only did people die without having a number of women around them, but there were many who passed away without having even a single witness present. . . .
Many ended their lives in public streets, during the day or at night. . . .
But . . . the hostile winds blowing there did not . . . spare the surrounding countryside. . . .
So great was the cruelty of Heaven, and, perhaps, also that of man, that from March to July of the same year, between the fury of the pestiferous sickness and the fact that many of the sick were badly treated or abandoned in need because of the fear that the healthy had, more than one hundred thousand human beings are believed to have lost their lives for certain inside the walls of the city of Florence.
Source: Giovanni Boccaccio, The Decameron, trans. Mark Musa and Peter Bondanella (New York: W. W. Norton, 1982), Copyright © 1982 by Mark Musa and Peter Bondanella, pp. 6–