oa To Publish Post Mortem: Boccaccio’s Latin Works and Martino da Signa

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After Boccaccio’s death in 1375, his library was taken to the convent of Santo Spirito in Florence. The move was prescribed by his testament, drafted over a year earlier. Boccaccio’s books first passed into the hands of Martino da Signa, Augustinian friar of Santo Spirito and subsequently its prior. This chapter investigates how the testament effected primary circulation for Boccaccio’s works, in particular those in Latin. Their earliest known erudite readers were men of letters who belonged to the so-called “circolo di Santo Spirito”. They turned to Martino to obtain copies made directly from Boccaccio’s originals. Florentine laymen and religious were involved, including the jurist Lorenzo di Antonio Ridolfi (1363-1443), the Chancellor Coluccio Salutati (1332-1406), the notary and poet Domenico Silvestri (1335-1411), the poet Cino Rinuccini (1350-1417), the Dominican friar Zenobi Guasconi (1325-1383), and the Franciscan friar Tedaldo della Casa (1330- 1409). While motivated to acquire copies of Boccaccio’s works for a variety of reasons, each man was somehow connected to Martino da Signa. The manuscript evidence provides fresh insights into this nexus and its contribution to Boccaccio’s posthumous recognition as a Latin author. Assessed from this perspective, his testament emerges as an effective instrument for publishing post mortem.