Page 154 - THE DECAMERON: A Visionary Journey in 100 Stories and 100 Etchings by Petru Russu

The Decameron The Sixth Day | The Tenth Novell Fra Cipolla visited Certaldo one August and, on a Sunday morning,
addressed the good folk who had come to mass in the parish church. He
Storyteller: Dioneo
said, "Ladies and gentlemen, you know it is your custom to send wheat
and oats to the poor of Baron Master St. Antony each year, according to
Highlighting the blatant deceptions often concealed under the
your ability and devotion, so that blessed St. Antony may protect your
guise of religion. Fryer Cipoll promised some honest country folk
oxen, asses, pigs, and sheep. You also pay your annual dues, especially
a feather from the same St. Lawrence that was in Noah's Ark.
Instead, he presented them with coals, claiming they were the
my superior, Master Abbot, to collect these offerings. After none, when
very coals used to roast that same St. Lawrence. those whose names are on the books of our confraternity. I am sent by
you hear the bells ring, come out of the church to the usual place where I
will deliver my sermon, and you will kiss the cross. Knowing your devotion
to Baron Master St. Antony, I will show you a most holy and goodly relic,
which I brought from the Holy Land overseas. It is one of the feathers
of the Angel Gabriel, which he left in the room of the Virgin Mary when
he came to make the annunciation in Nazareth." Having said this, he
continued with the mass.

Among those in the church were two wily young men, Giovanni del
Bragoniera and Biagio Pizzini. Though they were on good terms with Fra
Cipolla, they decided to make fun of him and his feather. They learned
that Fra Cipolla was to have breakfast in town with a friend. While he was
at the table, they went to the inn where he lodged. Biagio kept the friar's
servant occupied while Giovanni searched for the feather. Fra Cipolla's
1985 HAND COLORED AQUA TINTA / AQUA FORTE
29,5X19,5 CM. | 11¾X7½ IN. (IMAGE SIZE). servant, Guccio, was a rascal. Fra Cipolla often joked about him, saying
he had nine qualities that would have spoiled the virtue, wisdom, and
holiness of Solomon, Aristotle, or Seneca. These qualities were laziness,
uncleanliness, lying, negligence, disobedience, foul-mouthedness,
recklessness, witlessness, and mannerlessness. Guccio was also fond
Certaldo, as you may have heard, is a town in Val d'Elsa within our
of the kitchen, especially if there was a maid. He had caught sight of a
countryside. Though small, it once had people of rank and wealth. One
coarse, fat woman named Nuta in the host's kitchen and left Fra Cipolla's
of the Friars of St. Antony, Fra Cipolla, would visit Certaldo once a year
room and belongings unattended to gossip with her.
to collect alms. Fra Cipolla, whose name means "onion" in Italian, was
warmly welcomed, partly because the onions produced in that district
Finding Guccio occupied, the young men entered Fra Cipolla's room and
were famous throughout Tuscany. He was small, red-haired, jolly-faced,
found the wallet containing the feather. They discovered a tail-feather of
and a very good fellow. Though he had no learning, he was such an
a parrot, which they believed was the feather Fra Cipolla had promised to
excellent and ready speaker that anyone who didn't know him would have
show. In those days, the luxuries of Egypt had scarcely been introduced
thought him a great rhetorician, perhaps even Tully or Quintilian. He was
into Tuscany, and people knew next to nothing about them. The young
either a gossip, friend, or lover to almost everyone in the countryside.
men took the feather and replaced it with pieces of coal. They set the
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The Decameron