#sophronia's opinion is just irrelevant I guess

[justletmeon12]

Saying The Decameron has aged badly is an understatement.

It'd be more accurate to say that I'm currently reading the ultimate precursor to r/arethestraightsokay.

One of the stories has the following general plot:

A guy's family engages him to a woman, Sophronia.

His friend sees Sophronia and becomes obsessed with her/overcome with lust.

He decides that he doesn't care as much about her as his friend does and decides to "give her" to him "as I would with any of my possessions" (yes, he refers to her as his possession). Accordingly, he helps his friend arrange to assault her on their wedding night, making the friend her lawful bridegroom without her knowledge or consent.

They tell her later and she leaves, telling her family. They are rightfully angry that the man they trusted lied to them and her in order to trick her into marrying a relative stranger, and make the whole affair public. They're also angry at the rapist.

In order to calm the situation down, the friend/rapist calls a huge meeting to talk about how they shouldn't be angry, because a) the gods willed him to have this woman, b) the original fiancé was acting within the sacred and uncriticizable bounds of friendship, c) he's better than his friend because he's richer and comes from a better city (Rome instead of Athens), d) "she was carefully, discreetly, and honorably given" to him in contrast to those awful women who elope or get married after becoming pregnant, e) it was her fault for just assuming that the man who came into her dark bedroom on her wedding night and asked her to confirm that she wanted to marry him, then had sex with her, was the man she'd just publicly married, and f) if they don't let him take her to Rome with him "as is [his] right," he'll wage war.

Inexplicably, they don't stone him to death, and he gets everything he wants.

The first guy becomes destitute and gets driven out of Athens. Because he's overly dramatic, he goes to Rome and, when his old friend doesn't recognize him, arranges to have himself falsely arrested for murder.

The rapist finds out and accuses himself of the same crime.

Inexplicably, the real criminal is driven by pity to confess.

Even more inexplicably, the praetor is fine with all of this and doesn't punish either of them for wasting his time.

The emperor gets involved and absolves the actual criminal and both friends.

The rapist makes his old friend co-owner all his stuff and "gave [him] as his wife one of his young sisters."

#the decameron #boccacio #are the straights okay #the straights are not okay #rape #assault played as romantic #or at least excusable if it's for the sake of another man #the stated theme of this section is “generosity” #there's a long post-lude about the incredible kindness and generosity of these two men in giving each other women #sophronia's opinion is just irrelevant I guess #there's a lot about how the rapist will just waste away without his “love” #whereas she “makes a virtue of necessity” and just transfers her affection to him #ick