Besides the three distinct series of romance above-mentioned, a fourth, perhaps, deserves mention, in which the heroes of antiquity are tricked out in the cos tume of mediseval knights. The exact date of their composition cannot be ascertained; but they were probably later in general than any of the other three series; and, at any rate, were for the most part not published till the end of the 15th and the beginning of the 16th centuries. The principal are the romance of Jason and Medea, of Mercedes, of (Edt?pas, and of Alexander. They arc all written in French, and the first two profess to be the work of a Raoul he Febre. An attempt is made to adhere, in the general outline of the stories, to the ancient myths, but most marvelous embellishments are added, such as only the middle ages could have conceived; while the transformations that the classi cal personages undergo are exceedingly ludicrous. Jove becomes a "king;" Mercury his "squire;" the fates " duennas;" Cerberus and the sphinx, "giants;" etc.
Before leaving this division of our subject we would observe that, though the romances of chivalry may appear infinitely tedious and absurd to a modern reader, they were immensely relished and admired during the ages in which they were produced; were widely disseminated, in different forms, throughout all Christendom, and were highly popular with later poets. The influence which they exercised on Pulei, Boiardo, Tasso, Spenser, etc., shows the strong hold that they must have had on the imagination of Europe; but, with the decline of chivalry, the spread of the more rational and artistic fictions of the Italian novelists, the revival of letters, and the general advancement in civilization of Christendom, the taste for the romances of chivalry also declined, until finally Cervantes laughed them out of literature, and well-nigh out of memory, in tla: beginning of time 17th century.
3. Development and lnilvenee of Fietion in Italy.—The Italians originated no romances of the kind described above. This resulted from various causes, the principal of which perhaps are: 1st, that they were really not a Gothic, but at least a semi-classic people; 2d, that they were more polished than the northern nations; and 3d, that instead of feudal chivalric institutions; the most characteristic political features of Italy, middle ages, were mercantile and lettered republics. There was what many be roughly called a middle class—of merchants—in Italy, when England and France and Spain contained really little more than nobles and serfs; and these were really the best instructed and the most enlightened portion of the community. Hence it is but natural that we shOuld find a style of fiction mirroring to some extent this more civilized and sober form of social life. That the classical romances had some influence on the development of Italian fiction is probable: seVOral of tales recorded in of Aristinetus, and in the Golden Ass of Apptilcius, are qUite like what Wereid in Boccaccio and others. The fables of Pilpai or Bidpai (q.v.), translated into Latin as early as the 13th c., were also not without a certain effect; but it is to the Arabico-Indian book of the seven counsel ors (better known as The Tales of lire Seven Wise Musters), still more to the stories of Petrus Alphonsus (whose work is entitled De Clericale Disciplina), and the Gesta Roma llOPUM (q.v.), a grotesque jumble of classical stories, Arabian apologues, and monkish legends, in the disguise of romantic fiction; but most of all perhaps to the Conks and lUbliaux (q.v.) of the French poets, that we must look for the first sources of those
almost innumerable novelletti which mark the earlier literary history of Italy.
The earliest Italian work of this sort is the Cento Novelle Antiehe, commonly called Il Novellino. It is a compilation by different hands—all unknowu—of stories floating l about, or taken with modifications from the sources above-mentioned, with one or two of the more graceful episodes in the romances of chivalry, and was executed towards the close of the 13th century. It was followed in 1358 by the Decameron of Boccaccio (q.v.) —the finest, in point of humor, sentiment, and style, of the whole set, but not more original in the matter of story than 11 Novellino. Its influence on early European litera ture was prodi7,i ous. Chaucer and Shakespeare in England have been in particular greatly indebted to it for incidents and plots; while in France—from whose Trouveres he had himself derived so much—Boccaccio had a number of distinguished imitators. In his own country his influence was so overwhelming that for some centuries Italian novelists could do nothing more than attempt to copy him. The principal of these imitators are Franco Sacchetti (1335-1410), Ser Giovanni (who began to write his novelletti in 1318, from Moliere got the plot of his Ecole des Femmes, and Shakespeare probably part of his story of the Merchant of Venice—though the story of time bond is far older, and is of Persian origin—Chaucer is also indebted to this Italian); Massuccio di Salerno (for. about 1470), more original than most of the post-Boccaccian novelists; Sabadino Belli Arienti (for, about 1483); Agnolo Firenzuolo; Luigi da Porta; Molza, and Giovanni Brevio (for. at the close of the 15th and in the first half of the 16th c.); Girolamo Para hosco (for. 1550); Marco Cademoste da Lodi (1544); and Giovanni Giraldi Cinthio (died 1573), noted particularly for his extravagant employment of sanguinary incidents, and the introduction of scenes of incredible atrocity and accumulated horrors. The seventh of his third decade of stories contains the story of Othello, the Moor of plot of Miwsure for Measure was also derived indirectly from him. Cinlhio was, in fact, the greatest favorite of all the Italian novelists with the Elizabethan dramatists. Besides these, we may further mention Antonio Francesco Grazzini (died 1583); Strapa redo (wrote 1554 et seq.) from whom Moliere, and also the French writers of fairy tales, derived numerous hints; while the ludicrous incident embodied in the Scottish song of The barrio.' o' our door forms one of the stories of this writer; Bandello (died 1555), the most widely known and read (out of Italy) of all the Italian novelists next to Boccaccio, and in whom we find the original of M'sssinger's play of The Picture, and of Shakes peare's Twelfth _Night; Granucci (published 1574); Malespini (published 1609); and Cam peggi (early part of 1711t c.). The best Frebeh imitations of these Italian tales are the Cent Nouvelles Nouvelles (printed 1456, and translated into English under the title of the Hundreth ...Very Myles, 1557). They are full of life, gayety, and imagination, and are written in a most naïve and agreeable manner; and the Heptameron of Margaret, queen cf Navarre, from which Shirley, the English dramatist, has taken the plots of two of Ifts comedies.