Apulia

In the Decameron, Apulia is presented through the working routes and household arrangements of two traveling traders. Its fairs connect the priest Dom Gianni di Barolo, based in Barletta, with Pietro da Tresanti, making the region a practical setting for a tale in which commerce, friendship, and hospitality meet.

A Region of Traveling Trade

Dom Gianni has a poor parish living, so he supplements it by carrying goods from fair to fair across Apulia with his mare. Pietro follows the same trade with an ass. Their livelihoods depend on movement between markets, while the story identifies them through their different home towns: Barletta for the priest and Tresanti for Pietro. Apulia is thus established not by a survey of its towns or customs, but by the routes of people making a living through small-scale buying and selling.

Friendship and Hospitality

The two men turn commercial acquaintance into close friendship. Dom Gianni calls Pietro Gossip Pietro, following Apulian usage, and lodges him at his parsonage when he visits Barletta, entertaining him as generously as his means allow. Pietro returns the hospitality at Tresanti, though his small house offers little room: he shares its single bed with his young wife, while Dom Gianni sleeps on straw beside the mare in the stable, where Pietro’s ass is also kept. The contrast between the priest’s welcome and the limits of Pietro’s lodging gives the regional setting a domestic scale. Apulia’s fair circuit brings the friends together; the uneven comforts of their homes shape how that friendship is practiced.