Month: June 2014
Ferondo cuckolded with fantastic lies in Boccaccio’s Decameron
Boccaccio’s Decameron is filled with stories. The story about Ferondo, according to its narrator Lauretta, is “a true story that looks more like a lie than was actually the case.”[1] The Decameron’s story about Ferondo concerns truth like the story of Hippocrates raising the dead and being killed in the thirteenth-century Old French Lancelot-Grail cycle. Fantastic romances can tell big lies and deep truth.
The wealthy peasant Ferondo had a very beautiful wife. An Abbot, saintly in all ways but in his relations with women, fell in love with Ferondo’s wife. Ferondo was simpleminded, but he watched carefully over his wife. The Abbot despaired of the usual means of having an affair with someone else’s wife.
Fantastic lies overcame Ferondo’s careful watch on his wife. The Abbot contrived to have Ferondo’s wife ask him to hear her confession. She confessed that her spiritual development was being hindered because her husband was utterly stupid and extremely jealous of her in relation to other men. The Abbot sympathetically told her:
My daughter, I do think it’s a terrible affliction for a beautiful and delicate lady like you to have an idiot for a husband, but it’s even worse, in my opinion, to have one who’s jealous, and since you have both kinds in the same man, it’s not hard for me to believe what you’re saying about how much you suffer.
The Abbot proposed that Ferondo die, be sent to Purgatory to be purged of his jealousy, and then be restored to life. In return for performing this long and complicated treatment, the Abbot asked Ferondo’s wife for sex.
With realistic-fantastic arguments, the Abbot persuaded Ferondo’s wife to accept his proposition. The Abbot appealed to her pride:
your beauty is so ravishing, so powerful, that love forces me to act like this, and let me tell you, when you consider how pleasing your loveliness is to saints, who are used to seeing the beauties of heaven, you have more reason to be proud of it than any other woman.
The Abbot promised comfort that she deserved, but wasn’t getting:
while Ferondo’s in Purgatory, I’ll be keeping you company at night and providing you with the kind of consolation he should be giving you. [2]
She wouldn’t be punished for her transgression:
No one will ever notice what’s going on, either, because they all believe in my saintliness just as much as — in fact, more than — you did a short while ago.
She had a special, God-given opportunity to get what other women want:
Don’t reject the grace that God is bestowing upon you, for you’ve been offered something that plenty of women long for, and if you’re sensible enough to follow my advice, it’ll be yours. Besides, I have some beautiful jewels, expensive ones, and I don’t intend to give them to anyone but you. [3]
Like many strong, independent women through the ages, Ferondo’s wife decided that she would have sex with the Abbot. Her husband meanwhile was undergoing purification in Purgatory for his sexual jealousy.
Ferondo was fantastically conducted to an earthly Purgatory. The Abbot had “wondrous powder” from a great Eastern prince, who had gotten it from the Old Man of the Mountain, who was the fabled leader of the Assassins, Rashid ad-Din As-sinan.[4] The Abbot gave Ferondo a somewhat cloudy glass of wine containing that powder. After a short time:
all of a sudden, Ferondo’s faculties were overwhelmed by such a powerful sensation of drowsiness that he dozed off while he was still standing, then fell to the ground, fast asleep.
The monks of the abbey, believing that perhaps Ferondo had collapsed from “some expulsion of gas out of his stomach,” unsuccessfully attempted to revive him. Ferondo’s wife and family came and mourned his death. Ferondo was then placed in a tomb. That night, with the assistance of a trusted monk from another town, the Abbot removed Ferondo from the tomb and placed him in a “lightless underground vault” built as a prison for punishing monks.[5] Ferondo awoke in that Purgatory.
In Purgatory, Ferondo was beaten, mocked, and purged of his jealousy. The Abbot’s trusted foreign monk entered the prison with a roar and thoroughly beat Ferondo with a bundle of sticks. Ferondo, wailing, asked where he was. The monk told him Purgatory. Then Ferondo asked if he’s dead. The monk affirmed that he’s dead. Then the monk gave Fernando some food that he said Ferondo’s wife brought to the church to have Masses said for his soul. Ferorndo complained that his wife didn’t give the church the good wine “from the cask that’s near the wall.” The monk then thoroughly beat Ferondo again. The monk explained to Ferondo:
If you should ever happen to return {to life}, make sure you remember what I’m doing to you now, and don’t you ever be jealous again. …
I’m dead too. I used to live in Sardinia, and because I praised one of my masters to the skies for his jealousy, I’ve been condemned by God to be punished by giving you food and drink and these beatings until He decides otherwise about you and me.
In Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night, Malvolio was tricked with fantastic lies and then held in “hideous darkness,” where the clown, pretending to be a curate, verbally abused him. The treatment of Ferondo is like that of Malvolio. A courtier in Twelfth Night remarks of what happens to Malvolio, “If this were play’d upon a stage now, I could condemn it as an improbable fiction.”[6] The same is true for the story of Ferondo in the Decameron.
Ferondo returned to the world farcically. After ten months of the Abbot and Ferondo’s wife enjoying intimate pleasure, she got pregnant. They decided to bring Ferondo back to life to be given responsibility for that pregnancy. With his voice disguised as a voice similar to that of the archangel Gabriel addressing Zacharias, the Abbot declared to Ferondo :
Be of good cheer, Ferondo, for it is God’s pleasure that you should go back to earth, where, after your return, your wife will present you with a son. And you shall name him Benedetto, for God is bestowing this grace on you in answer to the prayers of your reverend Abbot and your wife, and out of His love for San Benedetto. [7]
The Abbot again put sleeping powder into wine he gave Ferondo. Once he had fallen asleep, Ferondo was placed back into the sarcophagus in his tomb. When he awoke, Ferondo began shouting and pushing his way out of the tomb. The monks of the abbey were frightened to see Ferondo emerging from the tomb. They raced off to the Abbot to tell of what they saw. The Abbot, speaking in the form of Jesus, prophetically declared:
Be not afraid, my sons. Take up the cross and the holy water and follow me. Let’s go and see what God Almighty wants to show us. [8]
They saw Ferondo risen from the tomb and alive in the flesh. Ferondo profusely thanked the Abbot for his prayers for him. The Abbot told Ferondo:
you should go and comfort your wife, who has done nothing but weep since you departed this life. And from now on may you live to serve God and preserve His friendship from this day forth.
Ferondo responded as the simpleton he was:
As soon as I find her, I’m going to give her a great big kiss. I love her so much.
After he had returned to his village, Ferondo was celebrated as a sage with knowledge of Purgatory. He told of what revelations he had received there from the ArkRanger Bagriel.[9] Precisely nine months after Ferondo rose from the tomb, his wife gave birth to a son. She led Ferondo to believe the son was his own. Moreover, as a result of his experience in Purgatory, Ferondo ceased being jealous of his wife.[10]
Everyone lived happily ever after. Ferondo was happy as a simpleminded cuckold. His wife had a more fulfilling life:
she lived with Ferondo no less chastely than she had in the past, except that, whenever she could do so conveniently, she was always happy to spend time with the Abbot who had attended to her greatest needs with such skill and diligence.
The Decameron’s Queen for the day, Neifile, exclaimed upon hearing the story of Ferondo:
How is anyone to tell a story as beautiful as the one we have just heard from Lauretta?
The beauty of the story of Ferondo is in the fantastic lies with which Ferondo was cuckolded. One can only marvel at the beauty of similar lies in determining paternity today.
Social will can imagine truth and beauty to be strangers. Big lies can be successful when small lies won’t work. That’s the deep truth in the true story of Ferondo.
* * * * *
Read more:
- deception and self-centeredness in the story of Alibech and Rustico
- self-government in the Decameron faces sex differences in guile
- fantastic lies in authoritative processes for establishing paternity
Notes:
[1] Giovanni Boccaccio, Decameron, Day 3, Story 8 (story of Ferondo), from Italian trans. Rebhorn (2013) p. 268. All subsequent quotes, unless otherwise noted, are from id. pp. pp. 268-78.
[2] While Ferondo’s wife had a son, the story suggests that Ferondo wasn’t making full payment on his marital debt to his wife. In Purgatory, Ferondo told his monk-tormentor:
I really loved her {his wife} a whole bunch before I died. Why, I used to hold her in my arms all night long and never stop kissing her, and when I felt the urge, I’d occasionally do something else as well.
[3] The story underscores elsewhere the cupidity of Ferondo’s wife. After she accepted the Abbot’s confessional proposition, the Abbot:
slipped a very beautiful ring into her hand on the sly and sent her away. Delighted by the gift, and looking forward to receiving others, the lady returned to her companions {and spoke highly of the Abbot}
At her home wearing black mourning dress after Ferondo’s apparent death, the Abbot visited her and reminded her of her promise:
Realizing that she was now free, unhindered by Ferondo or anyone else, and spotting another fine ring on the Abbot’s finger, the lady told him that she was ready to do it and arranged for him to pay her a visit that evening.
[4] For a sleeping potion (opiate) described realistically in a medical-technical context, see Decameron 4.10.
[5] The Abbot’s abbey is in Tuscany. The Abbot’s confederate was a monk from Bologna.
[6] Shakespeare, Twelfth Night, Act III, Scene IV, ll. 119-20. The tormenting of Malvolio, confined in darkness as a madman, is in Act IV, Scene 2. The Decameron was first translated into English in 1620. Armstrong (2007). Shakespeare’s All’s Well That Ends Well is based on Decameron 3.9, probably via a French translation. Cassell (2006).
[7] Cf. Luke 1:13-14.
[8] “Do not be afraid” is a common phrase in the Bible. It typically signals a divine revelation. In Matthew 16:24, Jesus calls to his disciples to “take up their cross and follow me.”
[9] ArkRanger Bagriel is Ferondo’s unknowing corruption of Archangel Gabriel.
[10] Madonna Lisetta da Ca’ Quirino, “somewhat of an idiot … Lady Pumpkinhead / Madonna Simple,” is duped with a fantastic religious story in Decameron 4.2 (the story of Frate Alberto pretending to be the Angel Gabriel). The parallel with the story of Ferondo breaks down with a characteristic sex difference: Frate Alberto, not Madonna Lisetta, in the end is subject to vicious physical punishment.
[image] Two souls kneel in prayer in purgatory, Master of Zweder van Culemborg, Dutch Book of Hours, 2nd quarter of 15th century. The Walters Art Museum, W.188.175R.
References:
Armstrong, Guyda. 2007. “Paratexts and their functions in seventeenth-century English Decamerons.” Modern Language Review. 102 (1): 40-57.
Cassell, Anthony K. 2006. “Pilgrim Wombs, Physicke and Bed-Tricks: Intellectual Brilliance, Attenuation and Elision in Decameron III:9.” MLN. 121 (1): 53-101.
Rebhorn, Wayne A., trans. 2013. Giovanni Boccaccio. The Decameron. New York : W.W. Norton & Company.
amen amen, fiat fiat: theological, liturgical, bureaucratic
The Hebrew word amen, which has the same Hebrew root as the word believe, was in the ancient world translated and transliterated into Greek and Latin. The Greek translation and transliteration of amen occurred before the Greek New Testament. The Latin translation and transliteration of amen occurred after the Greek New Testament. Nonetheless, about five centuries after the New Testament, Christians writing in both Greek and Latin had developed liturgical phrases with amen both translated and transliterated. The translated-transliterated amen pair probably was a means for multilingual liturgical accessibility. It could have reflected theological interpretation of the New Testament, but its contextual usage wasn’t highly theological. In any case, transliterated-translated amen became in Latin phrases like “amen, amen, fiat, fiat” bureaucratic boilerplate.
Within Hebrew scripture, amen can be understood as a concluding emphatic “so be it.” When Hebrew scripture began being translated into Greek in the early-to-mid third century BGC, amen was translated into Greek with Greek words meaning “so be it.” Later translations of Hebrew scripture into Greek, but before the Greek New Testament, transliterated amen. Transliterating amen plausibly became the favored Greek form as Greek-speaking Jews became more educated in Hebrew scripture. The Greek New Testament uniformly uses amen transliterated into Greek. The Vulgate uniformly use amen transliterated into Latin.[1]
Christian theological understanding supported recovery of the translated form of amen. In Luke 1:38, Mary says to the Angel Gabriel, “Let it be done with me according to your word.” Mary’s affirmation is a world-changing statement from a Christian perspective. It opened the path for the incarnation of Christ in Mary’s womb. In the Greek New Testament, Mary’s phrase “let it be done” was essentially the early Jewish translation of amen from Hebrew into Greek. Mary’s “let in be done” in Latin was fiat, which became the Latin translation of amen. This can be understood as more than just an obscure technical matter. A papal encyclical in 2003 observed, “there is a profound analogy between the Fiat which Mary said in reply to the angel, and the Amen which every believer says when receiving the body of the Lord.”[2]
Early use of a translated-transliterated amen pair apparently was liturgical, but not profoundly reverential. Christian inscriptions from about fifth-century Athens include Greek translated-transliterated amen pairs in contexts of broad Christian cultural elaboration. The two surviving pairs have opposite order of the translated and transliterated words. If the pairing of amen forms early on had been perceived to have profound theological significance, the order probably would have been fixed. Moreover, the Hebrew transliteration probably would have been first in a significantly fixed order.
Latin use of translated-transliterated amen was free and superficial. The great synod held in Africa (Carthage) in 418 apparently used the phrase “amen, amen, fiat, fiat” in the context of condemning shameful activity.[3] A ninth-century book uses the same phrase in a book curse, as does a tenth-century excommunication.[4] An “amen, fiat, fiat, fiat” occurs in an eleventh-century prayer book describing a prayer for the adoration of the cross.[5] A transliterated-translated triple amen (amen, amen, amen, fiat, fiat, fiat) occurs in an eleventh-century prayer to control a fever.[6] The thirteenth-century Old French Romance of the Rose used “amen, amen, fiat, fiat” in a humorous context involving barons affirming a ridiculous sermon.[7] By the sixteenth century, Rabelais’s Gargantua and Pantagruel mocked the phrase with the exclamation:
amen, amen, fiat, fiatur, ad differentiam papae
{amen, amen, do this, does that, to be different from papal bulls}[8]
What probably originated as a means for making Christian liturgy more widely accessible had become bureaucratic boilerplate.
Mary, the mother of Jesus, was a young woman from a small town. She wasn’t a bureaucrat. Her fiat doesn’t belong in bureaucratic boilerplate.
* * * * *
Read more:
- amen from Hebrew into Greek in early Christian inscriptions
- wise Bishop Nonnus in the Life of Saint Pelagia the Harlot
- Jesus performs before his disciples and the Canaanite woman
Notes:
[1] Here’s a table of representations of amen in translations of Hebrew scripture. The Hebrew Book of Numbers is part of the Pentateuch, and thus was probably among the first Hebrew scripture translated into Greek. Amen in Numbers 5:22 was translated into Greek. Nehemiah, in contrast, was probably relatively late in being translated into Greek. Amen in Nehemiah 5:13 and 8:6 is transliterated into Greek. St. Augustine used a transliterated Latin amen in his Sermon 58.
[2] Pope John Paul II, Encyclical Letter, Ecclesia De Eucharistia (2003), section 55. Here’s a Christian theological reflection on amen.
[3] A twelfth-century manuscript of canons attributed to Polycarp includes Polyc. 3.11.5, “Ex conc. Africano. Peruenit ad nos fama sinistra — Amen, amen. Fiat, fiat.” Motta (1983) p. 243.
[4] Book curse in a Sacramentary in St. Benoil-sur-Loire, attributed to the ninth century. See The British Magazine, Aug. 1, 1836, “The Dark Ages,” p. 127. A book curse used in a thirteenth-century Middle-English manuscript of Ancrene Wisse (Corpus Christi College, Cambridge MS 402) uses the form “Amen, fiat (thrice). Amen.” For an excommunication example, see William Robertson. 1769. The History of the Reign of the Emperor Charles, v. 1, p. 330 (excommunication text from 988 GC). An excommunication text in the 12th-century Textus Roffensis uses the phrase, “amen, fiat, fiat, amen.” See John Johnson (1847), The Theological Works, p. 250, note.
[5] Boynton (2007) p. 930, text of Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, MS Rossi 205, Fols. 93r-96r (11th century Psalter from Subiaco).
[6] Franceschini (1952) p. 183.
[7] Dahlberg (1995) p. 338 (l. 20694). The Romance of the Rose was the center of a largely unnoticed querelle about the literary treatment of men. The Chronicle of Florence of Worcester for A.D. 1112 records a council of bishops, including the Pope, together exclaiming, “Amen, Amen! Fiat, Fiat!” H.G. Bohn (1854), The Chronicle of Florence of Worcester, p. 224.
[8] Francois Rabelais, Gargantua and Pantagruel, Bk. 3, Ch. 14.
[image] Mary, the mother of Jesus, nursing Jesus. The man, interpreted as Isaiah or Balaam, seems to be gesturing to a celestial sign of Jesus’s birth. Fresco in the Catacomb of Priscilla, Rome. Probably early third century. Thanks to Wikipedia.
References:
Boynton, Susan. 2007. “Prayer as Liturgical Performance in Eleventh- and Twelfth-Century Monastic Psalters.” Speculum. 82 (04): 896-931.
Dahlberg, Charles, trans. 1995. Guillaume de Lorris and Jean de Meun. The Romance of the Rose. 3rd ed. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press.
Franceschini, E. 1952. “Miscellanea.” Aevum. 26 (2): 180-183.
Motta, Giuseppe. 1983. “Nuove identificazioni nella collezione canonica detta ‘Polycarpus.'” Aevum. 57 (2): 232-244.
COB-95: bean-counting skill development
Top bureaucracies have formal programs of continual bean-counting skill development. Under the American Bean Counters Association’s Continuing Bean Counting Education (ABCA CBCE) standards, managers are required to drop a handful of three-bean mix on each worker’s desk monthly. The worker must successfully separate and count the brown, green, and red beans within the ABCA CBCE performance standard time.
Some bureaucracies prefer to have six managers drop a handful of three-bean mix on three workers’ desk. Two managers are assigned per worker, with each manager dropping a half-handful of three-bean mix on the worker’s desk. With three managers per worker, each manager drops a third of a handful. One worker is responsible for aggregating and counting the red beans, one worker the brown beans, and one worker the green beans. ABCA CBCE training guidelines don’t prescribe a specific procedure for how this is to be done. Before the training exercise, management should meet and draw up a strategic training plan specifying whether workers should count each color bean before transfering them to the worker responsible for that color, or whether each worker should only count the beans of the color for which she is assigned. The latter strategic plan is considered to have more bureaucratic merit.
To develop industry-leading bean-counting skills, organizations shouldn’t limit themselves to bean counting. A handful of quinoa kernels make for a much bigger bean-counting exercise than traditional beans. The most advanced tool for bean-counting exercise are chia seeds. Chia-seed counting can keep workers busy for many hours, if not days, with only minimal managerial effort in performing the work droppings.
To push worker skill development to the max, cook up the three-bean training beans and serve them to the workers with copious amounts of cheap soda pop. Then give them a double handful of chia-seed counting. In addition, give workers strict orders not to get up from their desks until they have double checked their chia-seed counts. At the conclusion of that training exercise, workers will be well situated to take on the most bureaucratic of bureaucratic tasks.
In other bureaucratic issues this month, a scientific study published in Psychological Science indicates that listening to “When I’m Sixty Four” makes persons younger. The study reports:
we asked {randomly} 20 University of Pennsylvania undergraduates to listen to either “When I’m Sixty-Four” by The Beatles or “Kalimba.” Then, in an ostensibly unrelated task, they indicated their birth date (mm/dd/yyyy) and their father’s age. We used father’s age to control for variation in baseline age across participants.
An ANCOVA revealed the predicted effect: According to their birth dates, people were nearly a year-and-a-half younger after listening to “When I’m Sixty-Four” (adjusted M = 20.1 years) rather than to “Kalimba” (adjusted M = 21.5 years), F(1, 17) = 4.92, p = .040.
Psychological Science published Brandt’s 2011 study, “Sexism and gender inequality across 57 societies.” Given that scholarly record, the study showing that listening to “When I’m Sixty Four” makes persons younger should be taken very seriously.
The New York Times, the world’s leading journalistic bureaucracy, has produced a report ominously titled Innovation. Fortunately, that title is misleading. The report is 97 pages long with a very attractive, panoramic cover sheet. The contents of the report affirm fundamental bureaucratic principles. Consider this quintessentially bureaucratic declaration from the report:
it is essential to begin the work of questioning our print-centric traditions, conducting a comprehensive assessment of digital needs, and imagining the newsroom of the future. (p. 7)
The task of establishing a strategic plan for the first-stage implementation of beginning the work of asking questions about a print-centric news approach should be delegated to a task force. The Times intends to consider a task force to examine establishing such a strategic plan when it moves on to “explore more serious steps”:
Consider a task force to explore what it will take to become a digital-first newsroom. (p. 96)
There is no reason for concern about democracy. The New York Times will continue to be a pillar of American bureaucracy.
On Hacker News, an engineer and architect of large enterprise products has brilliantly described coding bureaucracy:
LINE 10 (remember this)
These things are never rewritten or refactored. They slowly evolve into a behemoth ball of mud which collapses under its own weight to the detriment of customers, a team of enterprise architects (usually from ThoughtWorks etc) usually appear at this point then attempt to sell outsourcing services who will “fix all the shit” for a tiny fee, leave a 200 page powerpoint (with black pages just to fuck your printer up). The company struggles on for a few years and is saved at the last minute by a buy out by a company at an early stage of the cycle who slowly port all the customers and buggy shit to their product platform. Then the team either dissolve and knowledge is lost or they take a cash sum from the sale and start up some ball of shit company that does the same again.
GOTO 10.
That’s enterprise 101 because the people that have been hit by the clue sticks know better than to subject themselves to this and do work in SF and SV and London. Me: I’m a masochistic crazy person who wonders every day why I don’t just go and write web sites for half the cash or flip burgers because it’s less painful.
Now you understand how IT is driving economic growth.
That’s all for this month’s Carnival of Bureaucrats. Enjoy previous bureaucratic carnivals here. Nominations of posts to be considered for inclusion in next month’s carnival should be submitted using Form 376: Application for Bureaucratic Recognition.