Costanza and Martuccio's Reunion and Marriage

Costanza and Martuccio’s relationship turns on a reversal of the poverty that first kept them apart: his attempt to become rich enough to marry her instead brings capture and separation, while the skill that later wins him wealth makes their reunion and marriage possible. Their story follows two lovers through distinct kinds of uncertainty—her father’s refusal, the sea’s violence, mistaken news of death, and a reunion in Tunis—before bringing them back to Lipari as husband and wife.

Courtship and the obstacle of poverty

Costanza, a young woman of a distinguished Lipari family, and Martuccio Gomito, a well-bred and capable young man from the same island, fall in love with one another. Martuccio seeks her hand from her father, but her father refuses because Martuccio is poor. The refusal makes poverty an immediate barrier to their intended marriage, rather than a sign that either lover lacks affection or resolve.

Martuccio responds by equipping a light ship with friends and relatives. He swears that he will not return to Lipari unless he comes back rich, then turns to piracy off the coast of Barbary, attacking those weaker than his party. His fortunes initially favor him, but he is not satisfied with becoming wealthy: he and his companions push for still greater riches. Saracen ships eventually capture them after a long defense, scuttle their vessel, kill many of the crew, and carry Martuccio to Tunis, where he is imprisoned and kept in misery. The means he chooses to overcome the obstacle to marriage thus prolongs their separation instead.

Costanza’s voyage and the report of death

News reaches Lipari from numerous sources that Martuccio and everyone aboard his ship have drowned. Costanza, already distressed by his departure, believes the report and grieves for him. Unable to bring herself to kill herself directly, she secretly leaves her father’s house at night and boards a small fishing smack that has been left ready with mast, sail, and oars. She rows out, sets sail, casts away the oars and rudder, and gives herself up to the waves, expecting the unsteered, unladen boat to founder or be driven onto a rock. She lies weeping at its bottom with her head wrapped in a mantle.

The boat does not bring about the death she expects. The story’s account identifies Susa as the place to which the wind carries her. Costanza survives and eventually lives in Tunis, where a kindly older woman gives her shelter. Martuccio, meanwhile, remains alive in captivity: each lover has been separated from the other by the sea and by news that makes the survivor appear lost. The apparent finality of his supposed death explains why Costanza’s later decision to seek him is not a simple continuation of an uninterrupted courtship, but a return to a love she has had reason to believe was over.

Martuccio’s counsel and Costanza’s search

Martuccio’s circumstances change when he gives the king of Tunis military advice. He observes that, after both sides have shot their arrows, his own side can reuse the enemy’s arrows: their thinner strings will take the arrows with wider notches, while the enemies cannot make use of his side’s arrows because their notches are too narrow for the enemies’ thicker strings. The king follows this counsel and wins the war. Martuccio rises from prisoner to a man of great favor, wealth, and standing.

Reports of his success reach Costanza, who has long thought him dead. Hearing that he is alive rekindles her love and restores the hope she had lost. She tells the older woman who has been sheltering her what has happened to her and asks to go to Tunis so that she can see Martuccio. The older woman approves and travels there with her, treating her as if she were a daughter. Carapresa accompanies them. Once they reach Tunis, the older woman sends Carapresa to discover Martuccio’s condition; learning that he is alive and prosperous, she chooses to tell him herself that Costanza has come.

Reunion, marriage, and return

The older woman brings Martuccio to her house under the pretext that a servant from Lipari wishes to speak with him privately. When Costanza sees him, she runs to embrace him but cannot speak; she weeps both in pity for the hardships they have endured and in joy at finding him alive. Martuccio is likewise astonished, having heard that Costanza was lost. He embraces and kisses her, and she tells him what has happened to her and how the older woman has treated her honorably.

Martuccio then reports their adventures to the king and asks leave to marry Costanza according to their law. The king hears Costanza’s account as well and approves the match, giving substantial and magnificent gifts to both of them. Their marriage is therefore not only a private reunion: the king’s welcome and generosity formally support their return together. Martuccio thanks and rewards the woman who sheltered Costanza, and then he and Costanza leave Tunis with Carapresa aboard a small ship. With a fair wind they return to Lipari, where they marry amid great rejoicing and celebrate splendidly. The narrative closes their separation with a long life together in peace and repose, reversing both the father’s original objection to Martuccio’s poverty and the lovers’ apparent loss of one another.