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Tuscan Abbot
The County Girl appears in Dioneo’s first tale (I, 4) as the lover first of the Young Monk and then of the Tuscan Abbot. Her striking beauty represents the power of sexual desire, and her willingness to have sex with both men demonstrates misogynistic medieval beliefs about women’s excessive sexual appetite.
The Country Girl Quotes in The Decameron
The The Decameron quotes below are all either spoken by The Country Girl or refer to The Country Girl. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
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Day 1: Fourth Tale
Quotes
One day, about noon, when all the other monks were asleep, he chanced to be taking a solitary stroll round the walls of the monastery, which lay in a very lonely spot, when his eyes came to rest on a strikingly beautiful girl, perhaps some local farmhand’s daughter, who was going about the fields collecting wild herbs. No sooner did he see her than he was fiercely assaulted by carnal desire.
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The girl, who was not exactly made of iron or of flint, fell in very readily with the Abbot’s wishes. He took her in his arms and kissed her a few times, then lowered himself on to the monk’s little bed. But out of regard, perhaps, for the weight of his reverend person and the tender age of the girl, and not wishing to do her any injury, he settled down beneath her instead of lying on top, and in this way he sported with her at considerable length.
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Get the entire The Decameron LitChart as a printable PDF.
The Country Girl Character Timeline in The Decameron
The timeline below shows where the character The Country Girl appears in The Decameron. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Day 1: Fourth Tale
...Young Monk goes for a country walk at noon one day. He finds a beautiful Country Girl —maybe a farmhand's daughter—collecting herbs. Overcome by lust, he invites her to his cell, where...
(full context)
Thinking he heard a noise in the corridor, the Young Monk excuses himself from the Country Girl and sees the Tuscan Abbot through a hole in the wall. Expecting a punishment, the...
(full context)
But when he goes in to confront the Country Girl , the Tuscan Abbot is overcome with lust. He justifies indulging his desires—he’s not likely...
(full context)
...Abbot pardons the monk, swearing him to secrecy. And, Dioneo adds, they probably bring the Country Girl back on a regular basis.
(full context)
