Lisa

Lisa’s story in The Decameron transforms a love that seems to have no possible future into a different kind of bond: Pedro of Aragon cannot be her husband, but he answers her suffering with compassion, arranges her marriage, and thereafter declares himself her knight. Her illness begins in a sharp awareness of rank and distance; its resolution does not erase that inequality, but changes what the king’s attention can mean.

Identity and Setting

Lisa is the only daughter of Bernardo Puccini, a very rich Florentine apothecary living in Palermo. She is described as beautiful and already of marriageable age. Her story takes place after the French have been expelled from Sicily and Pedro of Aragon has become ruler of the island. The political setting brings a king into the life of a merchant’s daughter, but does not make their social positions interchangeable: Lisa recognizes from the outset that her own condition leaves little hope of a happy outcome with him.

Pampinea tells Lisa’s story on the tenth day, after the company has praised the magnanimity of King Charles. She presents Pedro, his adversary, as the subject of a similarly commendable deed toward a Florentine woman. Lisa’s private crisis is thus framed not only as a tale of love, but as an example of princely conduct measured by how power responds to vulnerability.

The Festival and the Growth of Love

Lisa first sees Pedro during a great festival in Palermo, held by the king and his barons. From a window, among other ladies, she watches him tilt in the Catalan fashion. Seeing him ride kindles an intense love in her. When the festival ends and she returns to her father’s house, her thoughts remain fixed on the king and on the disparity between his exalted station and her own.

She cannot make herself cease loving him, but neither can she disclose her passion. Pedro has not noticed her and gives no sign that he knows of her feelings. The distance is therefore both social and personal: Lisa loves someone who does not know she exists as a lover, and her awareness of that imbalance deepens her distress rather than checking her attachment.

As her love grows, melancholy follows, until Lisa falls sick and visibly wastes away. Her parents are deeply concerned and try to hearten her with tenderness; physicians and medicines also fail to help. In despair of ever attaining the love she wants, she has chosen, as the story presents it, not to go on living. Her passion becomes legible to others first as a bodily decline, while its cause remains concealed.

Confession Through Minuccio

Before she dies, Lisa decides that the king must learn both of her love and of her intention. She asks her father to bring Minuccio d'Arezzo, a singer and player valued at court and welcomed by Pedro. Bernardo assumes she wants music to cheer her. Minuccio comes with a viol, speaks kindly to her, plays several pieces, and sings. The songs, intended as consolation, instead intensify Lisa’s passion.

Lisa then asks to speak with Minuccio alone. She entrusts him with her secret and asks him to keep it faithfully, except from the king, and to help her make Pedro aware of it. She explains that seeing him at the festival set her love alight, that she knows the love is ill-suited to a king, and that she cannot drive it away or even lessen it. Since she cannot bear its pain, she has resolved to die; she fears leaving the world without Pedro knowing what she felt. The request gives her a way to act without publicly approaching the king herself, and Minuccio becomes the trusted intermediary between her private suffering and the court.

The King’s Visit and Lisa’s Recovery

Minuccio reports Lisa’s words to Pedro. The king praises her worth and says he will visit that day toward vespers, sending Minuccio back to comfort her with the news. Minuccio returns with his viol and sings the song to her. Lisa is so relieved and pleased that she immediately shows marked signs of improvement and waits eagerly for the king’s promised visit. The sequence reverses the earlier effect of music: Minuccio’s first songs had sharpened her distress, while the news carried through him now brings comfort.

Pedro rides to the Puccini house toward vespers, ostensibly for an outing. He asks Bernardo what has become of Lisa and whether she is married. Bernardo replies that she is not, that she has been very ill, and that she has recently improved greatly. Pedro understands what her improvement means. He goes to her chamber with Bernardo and two companions, takes Lisa by the hand, and urges her to recover her strength rather than remain sick while still young. Lisa answers indirectly: she says that imposing grievous burdens on her small strength caused her illness and that, thanks to his goodness, he will soon see her well. Pedro alone understands the allusion.

Marriage and Lasting Regard

During the visit, Pedro comes to value Lisa more highly. He inwardly curses Fortune for having made her the daughter of a man of low condition, recognizing the social barrier that has helped make her love so hopeless. He stays long enough to comfort her further, then takes his leave. The account’s resolution, as announced in the story heading, is that Pedro comforts the love-sick Lisa and marries her to a noble young gentleman. He kisses her on the brow and ever afterward avows himself her knight.

The ending distinguishes compassion from romantic possession. Lisa’s love for Pedro does not culminate in their marriage: the king arranges her marriage to another man, while his kiss and lasting pledge give her a recognized place in his regard. Her disclosure has not changed her birth or made the original social disparity disappear. It has, however, turned an unspoken passion into an occasion for the king to act generously, and her movement from wasting illness to marriage and enduring royal favor gives the story its decisive reversal.