The Decameron [7.3, 7.4, 8.3, 8.7, 8.8]

7.3 Question: What do you think about Brother Rinaldo and his longing for his godchild's mother? What does this say about religion and the expectations that men had for women?

I think that Brother Rinaldo pining over his godchild's mother is very common for a man in this time. It is interesting, considering he is a friar, to be longing after not only a woman, but a woman who is married with a child. He stops at nothing to lie with her and eventually does get her in bed. Like a lot of the other stories in "The Decameron," there are friars, monks, and nuns, all sleeping with each other which is a definite corruption of the church and everything that they believe in. Friars pining after women was very bad in the church's eyes, but they continued to do it. I also think that it is interesting what this story says about the expectations that men had for women in those times. Men believed that women should be willing and open to sleep with a man if he wished to. Men believed that there was no consent in sexual relations between them and any lady that they wished. It was a "sleep with me, or die" kind of look that men had on the situation.

7.4 Question: Why do you think that there is such a wide theme of women fooling men? What is it about femininity that makes Boccaccio right about women being so deceiving?

I think that there are so many stories about women fooling men because they believe that women should have the same pleasures of men. Although it is not widely accepted, and is still not fully accepted today, in the medieval times, women were used only for an object of attraction. They were highlighted in stories for their leniency with sex and these tales of women tricking men are a way to get back at the stereotype. Boccaccio creates femininity as being so deceiving because they are the weaker sex in his eyes and possibly wants to create them and make them seem more evil that they really are. He is warning the reader of the temptations that women put men through and how sometimes, women's power over men can be painful and very deceiving.