Masuccio Salernitano, Tommaso

MASUCCIO SALERNITANO, TOMMASO. - A nobleman of the Guardati family, born in Salerno, died there in the 15th century; but he lived for a long time in Naples as secretary to Prince Roberto Sanseverino and as a familiar of King Ferdinand, and he enjoyed the friendship of illustrious lords and famous humanists, not only of Naples.

In 1475 he finished the Novellino, later published in Naples in 1476 under the editorship of Francesco del Tuppo, publisher Sisto Reisinger. The book contains 50 novellas divided into 5 parts, a "prologue" and a "parlamento de lo autore" at the end; the novellas too have a fivefold division: "argomento", "dedica", "esordio", "narrazione", "Masuccio", that is, a commentary in the author's own person. His declared masters are Juvenal and Boccaccio, and following their example his polemic is harsh against women (though not all of them) and against the religious (though not all of them, and never against religion). The themes are of lust, except for certain princely "magnificenze" in the last part; and the taste for framing devices as well as the character of the style make of M. a Boccaccio transplanted to Naples and to the court, rather heavy in the comic and effective in the tragic, better suited to an author who aims at the solemn and lapses into the baroque.

Alberto Chiari