Teseida: The seductiveness of the epic

In De vulgari eloquentia: II, 2 Dante had lamented the absence of an epic in the vernacular: “Arma vero nullum latium adhuc invenio poetasse”[1]. Almost as if to take up Dante’s challenge, Boccaccio decided to tackle the task, composing, between 1339 and 1340, the Teseida. Of this poem in octaves, made up of twelve books, on the model of Virgil’s Aeneid and Stazio’s Tebaide, we have an original annotated copy, the cod. Laurenziano Acquisti & Doni 325. The work must have been begun in Naples, if in the Sacre famis, written in 1339, Boccaccio asks the unknown recipient of this epistle in Latin to get him an annotated copy of the Tebaide so that he can finish his work, which he probably did in Florence.

Inspired by the stories of the Theban cycle, the poem opens with a narration of the deeds of Theseus who, after a successful sortie against the Amazons, returns to Athens and takes on the task of governing the city, ending Creonte’s tyranny. Amongst the prisoners of war are Cadmus’ grandchildren, Arcita and Palemone. From the prison in which they have been locked up, the two youths can spy upon Theseus’ lovely sister-in-law Emilia when she goes to the garden to collect flowers, and they both fall in love with her. Arcita, thanks to a friend’s help, is freed; Palemone, jealous of Emilia, who his rival can now meet, also manages to get himself freed and challenges Arcita to a duel. Discovered by Theseus, the two confess to the King why they are fighting. Theseus, touched by the nobility of the amorous sentiment of the two duellers, pardons them and calls for a tournament, the winner of which will marry Emilia. Arcita, after invoking Mars’s help, manages to have the better over Palemone, the protégé of Venus. But in the fight the knight is mortally wounded and, on point of death, insists that Emilia should promise to marry Palemone.

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[1]Dante, De Vulgari Eloquentia, ed. S. Cecchin, Turin 1983, p. 98.