[540] Cf. Vita di Dante, ed. cit., p. 55; Comento, ed. cit., cap. 1. pp. 5, 7; and cf. Hortis, Acceni alle Scienze, etc., p. 14.
[541] The best study and the fullest of these Latin works is that of Hortis, Studi sulle opere Latine di Giovanni Boccaccio (Trieste, 1879). It runs to some 950 quarto pages. I do not propose here to give more than a sketch of these Latin works of Boccaccio.
[542] It was apparently finished about 1362. Cf. Hortis, Studi, p. 89, n. 2, and p. 164.
[543] Cf. F. Villani (ed. Galletti), Liber de civitatis Florentiæ famosis civibus ex codice Mediceo Laurentiano nunc primum editus (Firenze, 1847), p. 17.
[544] Cf. Comento, ed. cit., cap. xii. Vol. II, p. 334.
[545] Cf. the dedication to "Mulieri clariss. Andrese Acciauolis," which begins: "Pridie, mulierum egregia, paululum ab inerti vulgo semotus, et a cæteris fere solutus curis, in eximiam mulieribus sexus laudem, et amicorum solatium, potius quam in magnum reipublicæ commodum, libellum scripsi." This dedicatory letter appears in all the editions, and is printed too by Corazzini, op. cit., p. 231.
[546] Cf. Boccaccio's own love story, supra, [p. 51] et seq.
[547] Decameron, IV, 2.
[548] Cap. 87.
[549] Caps. 77, 71, 81.