Calandrino—Tessa

Calandrino and Tessa’s marriage recurs as a comic contest in which Calandrino’s credulity and self-importance repeatedly become household trouble. A false diagnosis makes him believe he is pregnant and lets his companions exploit his fear for food and money; a later ruse persuades Tessa that he is pursuing another woman, bringing her face to face with his attempted tryst. The episodes make their marriage less a portrait of mutual confidence than a cycle of deception, humiliation, and domestic reproach.

Identity and Domestic Setting

Calandrino is Tessa’s husband, and the stories present their relationship through moments when his conduct spills into the household. Tessa is described as modest: when Calandrino, in front of her, blames her for his supposed pregnancy, she blushes, lowers her head, and leaves without replying. That silence contrasts sharply with the disorder his words create. He complains openly about their sexual relations and threatens that, if he recovers, she will not again have the upper hand; the joke depends on his treating an invented pregnancy as a real consequence of his wife’s desire.

In another episode, Tessa is again drawn into a scheme organized around Calandrino’s sexual vanity. Nello reminds her that Calandrino had beaten her after returning with stones from the Mugnone, then claims that her husband has fallen in love with a woman and arranged to meet her. The account uses a real grievance as bait: Tessa sets off to catch him, believing she is about to answer an actual betrayal rather than walk into a prank.

The False Pregnancy

Bruno and his companions enlist Master Simone to tell Calandrino that he is with child. The supposed diagnosis turns his marital boasting against him. He blames Tessa for always taking the upper position, while she, ashamed by the public sexual joke, withdraws rather than contest him. Calandrino’s companions struggle to suppress their laughter; Master Simone laughs openly as the victim accepts the impossible explanation.

Fear makes Calandrino an easy customer. He offers two hundred crowns, money he had intended to spend on an estate, if the doctor can prevent him from giving birth. Master Simone prescribes a pleasant drink for three mornings, but demands three pairs of fat capons and five silver crowns for additional ingredients. Calandrino hands over the money and the capons. The conspirators eat the birds together, while the supposed treatment is only a little clary. After three days Master Simone declares him cured, and Calandrino resumes his business, praising the doctor for having relieved him of his pregnancy without pain. Tessa recognizes the trick and scolds her husband for falling for it. Her insight does not prevent the deception, but it makes her the only person in the household who sees clearly what has happened.

The Talisman and the Barn

A later plot exploits Calandrino’s desire to make Niccolosa yield to him. Bruno gives him a fabricated charm, made with invented writing on virgin parchment, and tells him to touch her with it so that she will follow him. Calandrino accepts the contrivance as a means of winning a woman, rather than recognizing that his companions are arranging another spectacle at his expense.

At the same time, Nello tells Tessa that Calandrino has a lover and that the pair plan to meet that day. Tessa takes the accusation seriously and hurries to the mansion with Nello. Calandrino, meanwhile, follows Bruno’s instructions: he touches Niccolosa with the script and goes to the barn, where she follows and shuts the door. The conspirators and Filippo watch the scene. As Calandrino tries to kiss Niccolosa by force, Tessa arrives, pushes the door open, and finds Niccolosa astride him. Niccolosa escapes; Tessa claws Calandrino’s face and pulls him about by the hair. The charm has not secured his mastery over anyone. Instead, the trick has brought his attempted conquest into the open and put him at Tessa’s mercy.

Reproach, Humiliation, and Comic Reversal

Calandrino cannot defend himself against Tessa. Scratched and flayed, he begs her to let him go and claims that the woman with him is the householder’s wife. His excuse does not restore his dignity: Tessa responds with contempt, while the conspirators pretend to have been drawn by the noise and then advise him to return to Florence lest Filippo discover the affair and punish him. Calandrino leaves dejected and never ventures back to the mansion.

The aftermath lasts beyond the scene. Tessa harasses him night and day with reproaches, and his ardent love comes to an end. The two episodes thus create a pointed recurrence: first Calandrino’s companions make him pay for a fictitious pregnancy, then they use his desire and Tessa’s suspicions to stage a public exposure. In both, his confidence in his own account of events is the source of his defeat. Tessa moves from embarrassed silence in the first prank to physical retaliation and sustained verbal reproach in the second, while the marriage remains the domestic arena in which his foolishness is both exploited and punished.