Page 120 - THE DECAMERON: 100 Days on 100 Etchings by Petru Rusu
P. 120

“Pietro di Vinciolo“



             A man called Pietro di Vinciolo decides to distract peers                    to find a knife. Pietro’s wife tries to cover her own tracks

              from his homosexuality by taking a wife. But he makes                       by loudly denouncing Ercolano’s wife. How could she do
              a mistake: he chooses a young redhead. You know                             such a thing? And she’s so old, too! Pietro goes off to bed
              those redheads Boccaccio says they can take on two                          without any supper and his wife thinks she’s off the hook.
              husbands. Pietro’s really not up to the challenge, so his                   But Fortune has other plans. Fate, in the form of a donkey,
              wife decides to find pleasure elsewhere. She enlists the                    wanders over and tramps on the lover’s fingers, which

              help of a local older woman who puts on a good show of                      are sticking out from under the chicken coop. He lets out
              religious devotion but really is a bit of a…madame. She                     a blood-curdling scream and Pietro rushes over to check
              encourages Pietro’s wife to have a bit of fun while she’s                   things out. And really, Pietro couldn’t be more pleased.

              still young. She’ll look out for a suitable man. Pietro’s wife              He’d been after this young man for his own purposes. So
              gives her a piece of meat by way of payment. The old                        he chews his wife out for blaming Ercolano’s wife, saying
              woman arranges a variety of men for Pietro’s wife and the                   that women are all alike. She notices that he doesn’t
              young woman’s quite satisfied. But one evening, Pietro                      seem to be all that angry. And he does seem to be
              returns home early from a dinner at his friend Ercolano’s                   holding her lover’s hand an awful lot. She tells Pietro that

              house and catches his wife on the hop. She hides her                        she really just wants what every wife wants. At least she
              lover under the chicken coop and pretends that all is well.                 takes her pleasure in men of high social standing. Pietro
              Pietro explains why he’s home so early. Ercolano’s wife                     tells her that he’ll work things out to everyone’s mutual

              had hidden her lover in the cupboard under the stairs                       satisfaction.  So she brings out some supper and they
              where she’d been bleaching her veils. The young man                         make a merry evening of it. Dioneo says that he doesn’t
              gave himself away by sneezing because of the chemicals.                     recall exactly how Pietro worked it all out, but the young
             You can imagine the scene, and Pietro had to carry the                       man spent the next day trying to figure out if he’d spent
              young lover out of the house before Ercolano had time                       more of the night with the husband or the wife.




















                                                                                                                                  “Pietro di Vinciolo” retrieved from publicly source: shmoop
     DECAMERON      120                                                                                      <https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/decameron/summary/fifth-day-tenth-story>
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