Ophelia de Vere

  Giovanni Boccaccio (1313–1375) occupies a pivotal position in European literary history. Alongside Dante and Petrarch , he belongs to the so-called tre corone fiorentine — the “three crowns” of Florence — who shaped Italian literature and helped carry it from the medieval world into the beginnings of the Renaissance . Best known as the author of the Decameron (c. 1350), Boccaccio transformed inherited narrative traditions, reorganised them into innovative structures, and in doing so, created a new model for prose fiction in Europe. Life and Background Born the son of a Florentine merchant, Boccaccio spent much of his youth in Naples , where he trained in commerce and banking — his father’s intended career path for him. Yet his real passion lay in literature. Essentially self-taught, he absorbed the learning of his time, when poetry, philosophy, and education were intertwined rather than distinct disciplines. He became a friend of Petrarch, a devoted admirer of Dante (eve...