
1353 The Decameron is finished
The Italian author Giovanni Boccaccio (1313–1375) is considered one of the early humanists. He was the illegitimate son of Boccaccio di Chellino, a merchant from the small town of Certaldo. At first the young Boccaccio apprenticed as a merchant, then he abandoned that career for the study of canon law (official regulations and doctrines of the church). Through his father, who was a financial adviser to King Robert of Anjou, he gained contacts to the cultivated society of the court at Naples. There he mingled with scientists, theologians, scholars, and lawyers. He studied astronomy, mythology, classical literature, French adventure romances, […]