Boccaccio, Giovanni (jōvänˈnē) [key], 1313–75, Italian poet and
storyteller, author of the Decameron. Born in Paris, the
illegitimate son of a Tuscan merchant and a French woman, he was
educated at Certaldo and Naples by his father, who wanted him to
take up commerce and law. In Naples he met (1336) the woman
(dubiously identified as Maria d'Aquino, illegitimate daughter
of King Robert) whom he was to immortalize in prose and verse as
Fiammetta. She is reputed to have introduced him at court and to
have urged him to write (c.1340) his early Filocolo, a long
vernacular prose romance. Other early works include the poem
Filostrato, which infused the legendary story of Troilus and
Cressida with the atmosphere of Neapolitan court life; the
Teseide, a poem in the style of the Aeneid; the psychological
romance La Fiammetta (written c.1344); the pastoral Ninfale
d'Ameto; and the allegorical Amorosa visione, imitative of
Dante. Boccaccio was recalled to Florence in 1341, and there he
met (1350) the great poet Petrarch