First Day
Before beginning the story-telling sessions, the ten young Florentines, 7 women and 3 men, referred to as the Brigata, gather at the Basilica di Santa Maria Novella and together decide to escape Black Death by leaving the city to stay in a fictional villa in the countryside for the next two weeks. Each agrees to tell one story each day for ten days. The stories are told in the garden of the first villa that the company stays at, which is located a few miles outside the city.
Under the rule of Pampinea, the first day of story-telling is open topic. Although there is no assigned theme of the tales this first day, six deal with one person censuring another and four are satires of the Catholic Church.
Read more about this topic: Summary Of Decameron Tales
Famous quotes containing the word day:
“This Day, whate’er the Fates decree;
Shall still be kept with Joy by me:
This Day then, let us not be told,
That you are sick, and I grown old,”
—Jonathan Swift (1667–1745)
““There’s not a man or woman
Born under the skies
Dare match in learning with us two,
And all day long we have found
There’s not a thing but love can make
The world a narrow pound.””
—William Butler Yeats (1865–1939)