The Book of Theseus

The Teseida (probably begun in Naples and finished in Florence, 1340–41) is an ambitious epic of 12 cantos in ottava rima in which the wars of Theseus serve as a background for the love of two friends, Arcita and Palemone, for the same woman, Emilia; Arcita…

His Teseida (1340–41) was the first classical epic to have been written in the vernacular, and it influenced the Italian epics of Ludovico Ariosto and Torquato Tasso. His De genealogia deorum gentilium (“On the Genealogy of the Gods of the Gentiles,” written c. 1350–75), a scholarly…

…the Nuptials of Emilia or The Book of Theseus). His Il ninfale d’Ameto, or, more properly, Commedia delle ninfe fiorentine (1341–42; “Comedy of the Florentine Nymphs”; Eng. trans. L’Ameto), a novel written in prose and verse, and his Elegia di Madonna Fiammetta (c. 1343; The Elegy of Lady Fiammetta or…