Lodovico(Anichino)—Madam Beatrice

Lodovico and Madam Beatrice’s relationship is an adulterous affair built on disguise, household access, and a reversal of trust. Lodovico enters her husband Egano’s service under the assumed name Anichino, having traveled to Bologna because he has become consumed by the desire to see Beatrice. Once he is established in the household, the affair depends not simply on his pursuit but on Beatrice’s willing response and her precise handling of Egano’s confidence in them both.

Identity and Circumstances

Lodovico is the only son of a Florentine gentleman who, having prospered in trade, wants his son to preserve the family’s nobility rather than take up commerce. He sends him to serve among other gentlemen at the French court, where Lodovico learns courtly manners. The affair’s story begins in Paris, when gentlemen returning from a visit to the Holy Sepulchre praise Madam Beatrice, the wife of Egano de' Gulluzzi of Bologna, as the most beautiful woman they have seen in all their travels. Their admiration awakens in Lodovico a longing to see her, although he has never yet been in love.

Lodovico persuades his father, with difficulty, to let him make what he claims is a pilgrimage to the Holy Sepulchre. Instead, he travels to Bologna, takes the name Anichino, and attends an entertainment where he sees Beatrice. She appears even more beautiful than he had imagined, and he resolves not to leave Bologna until he has won her love. The assumed identity is not a passing cover: it lets him approach the married woman through the ordinary, trusted structure of her household.

Entry into Egano’s Household

To gain access to Beatrice, Lodovico chooses service with her husband. He sells his horses, arranges for his servants to act as if they do not know him, and asks his host to find him a position with a gentleman. The host recommends Egano, who employs many servants and prefers them to be well presented. Before leaving Egano, the host secures an agreement to hire Anichino.

Lodovico serves Egano so well that Egano comes to value him highly. He trusts Anichino not only with his own affairs but with the management of the household’s business. That intimacy with Egano gives Lodovico frequent opportunities to see Beatrice, while his servant’s role makes his presence seem unremarkable. Beatrice, for her part, has often privately approved of his appearance and manners, though at first she does not know that he loves her. Their positions are therefore unequal in a revealing way: Lodovico engineers his entry, but the relationship changes only when Beatrice chooses to answer his desire.

Confession and Mutual Consent

The turning point comes while Egano is away fowling. Beatrice and Anichino play chess; he contrives to lose, pleasing her. When her women leave them alone, he sighs. Beatrice asks what troubles him, and his first answer suggests that the cause is more serious than losing the game. She presses him to confide in her and assures him that she will keep what he tells her secret.

Anichino then discloses who he is, what he heard about her in Paris, how he came to Bologna, and why he entered her husband’s service. He asks her to return his love; if she will not, he asks only to be allowed to continue loving her without being driven from his present position. The disclosure puts the truth of his disguise before Beatrice and makes his desire explicit. She believes him and is moved by his pleading. She tells him that his words have won her love, promises him a meeting in her chamber that night, and seals her promise with a kiss. Her response makes the affair mutual: she is not merely the object of his plan but an active participant who chooses its next step.

A Test That Reverses Trust

That night, Egano goes to bed after supper, tired from fowling, and Beatrice leaves the chamber door open as promised. Anichino enters at the appointed time and reaches toward her, but she takes his hand and holds it fast. She turns so that Egano wakes, then asks her husband whom he regards as his most loyal and trusted servant. Egano names Anichino without hesitation.

Beatrice uses that confidence to stage a false exposure. She tells Egano that Anichino solicited her while he was away and that she pretended to agree, arranging for him to meet her at the pine tree in the garden. She proposes that Egano put on her gown and veil and wait there, so he can test his servant’s supposed fidelity. Egano accepts the plan and goes out disguised in her clothes. Once he has left, Beatrice locks the chamber door. Anichino, who has been frightened by the apparent turn against him, realizes what she has done; she invites him to bed, and they take their pleasure together.

Beatrice then gives him a cudgel and sends him into the garden to treat the disguised Egano as though he were the woman who had solicited him. Anichino follows her instructions, denounces the figure as a wicked woman, and beats Egano. Egano flees without recognizing the deception. When he returns, he reports that Anichino mistook him for Beatrice and gave him a beating, but he still interprets the servant’s conduct as proof of loyalty. Beatrice completes the reversal by suggesting that Anichino has tested her with words and Egano with blows. Her deception preserves the very trust that makes the affair possible.

Continuation and Narrative Significance

Egano concludes that he has the truest wife and most faithful servant a gentleman could have. He and Beatrice later make merry with Anichino about the incident, while the lovers continue to enjoy their affair for as long as Anichino remains in Egano’s service in Bologna. The relationship’s outcome is not a public marriage or a disclosed attachment but an ongoing secret secured by a successful performance of fidelity.

The episode makes concealment a shared practice with unequal contributions. Lodovico supplies the assumed name, the self-effacing servant’s role, and access to the house; Beatrice reads the situation, commits herself to him, and directs the deception that keeps Egano unsuspecting. The cudgel makes that deception concrete: Egano’s mistaken punishment of his own trusted servant becomes evidence, in his eyes, of the servant’s loyalty. The affair thus turns household authority inside out without dislodging it. Egano retains his confidence, while the couple use it to protect a relationship he believes does not exist.