Rosenberg, Jakob. Martin Schongauer Handzeichnungen. Mu-
nich: Piper, 1923.
Shestack, Alan. The Complete Engravings of Martin Schongauer.
New York: Dover, 1969.
Susanne Reece
SERCAMBI, GIOVANNI
(1348–27 May 1424)
Giovanni Sercambi was born in Lucca, where his father
ran a book and paper store; he thus grew up with a good
library at hand. He was educated by private tutors for a
government career, and he prospered by supporting the
rise to power of the Guinigi family. After 1400, however,
feeling neglected by the Guinigi, he withdrew from
politics and began to write. Sercambi’s works include A
Chronicle of the Affairs of Lucca (from 1164–1424, in-
cluding events in which he had participated); the Monito,
a compendium of advice on fi nance and administration
based on his own experiences in public service; and, in
his fi nal years, the Novelle, a collection of 155 tales.
The book of advice, dedicated to the Guinigi, advo-
cates practical measures for maintaining control: taking
a census of the citizens, forbidding them to possess arms,
and ensuring that the legislative council is fi lled with
one’s own friends and relatives. The novelle, which draw
in part on Sercambi’s history of Lucca, are similarly
hard-boiled; the collection is fi lled with tales of deceit,
fraud, theft, clerical misbehavior, and the self-serving
manipulations of lovers, parents, children, dealers, and
clients. A few of the tales are about Sercambi himself,
e.g., how he escaped an attack by highway robbers.
The tales are framed by an account of a plague in
1374, during which a group of men and women travel
around Italy to avoid the disease. As on some of the
actual penitential pilgrimages occasioned by recurring
plagues, the travelers agree to pool their money, hear
mass every morning, and refrain from sexual activity
during the journey. Boccaccio’s infl uence is clear in
the setting (the plague), in the inclusion of occasional
poems, and in more than twenty of the tales; but instead
of having various members of the group narrate in turn,
Sercambi’s travelers appoint one storyteller to keep
them entertained. This character often tells stories ap-
propriate to the places they are visiting: stories of theft
near Naples, of Roman history at Rome, of Venetian
customs at Venice. Many of the stories are drawn from
contemporary or recent events, as well as from Roman
myth and history, popular fabliaux, and other medieval
collections of tales, such as the Disciplina clericalis
and the Decameron. The titles of the stories suggest
the moral categories of preachers’ exempla: “On Great
Prudence,” “On Supreme Avarice,” “On Supreme Jus-
tice,” “On Vain Lust,” and so forth.
Sercambi’s style is rough, and his tales were rarely
mentioned before the late 1700s, when one of the two
fi fteenth-century manuscripts was found. However,
since its fi rst printing in Venice in 1816, the Novelle has
been reprinted many times.
See also Boccaccio, GiovanniFurther ReadingEditions and Translation
Le croniche, ed. Salvatore Bongi. Rome: Fonti per la Storia
d’Italia Pubblicate dall’Istituto Storico Italiano, 1892.
Italian Renaissance Tales, trans. Janet Smarr. Rochester, N.Y.:
Solaris, 1983, pp. 49–68.
Novelle, ed. Giovanni Sinicropi. Scrittori d’ltalia, 250–251. Bari:
Laterza, 1972.
Novelle, ed. Luciano Rossi, 3 vols. Rome: Salerno, 1974.
Critical Studies
Alexanders, James W. “A Preparatory Study for an Edition of
the Novelle of Giovanni Sercambi.” Dissertation, University
of Virginia, 1940.
Di Francia, Letterio. Novellistica, Vol. 1. Milan: Vallardi, 1924,
pp. 223–260.
Di Scipio, Giuseppe Carlo. “Giovanni Sercambi’s Novelle:
Sources and Popular Traditions.” Merveilles et Contes, 2,
1988, pp. 25–36.
The Italian Novella: A Book of Essays, ed. Gloria Allaire. New
York: Routledge, 2003.
Marietti, Marina. “Imitation et transposition du Décaméron chez
Sercambi et Sermini: Réécriture et contexte culturelle.” In
Réécritures, Vols. 1–2, Commentaires, parodies, variations
dans la littérature italienne de la Renaissance. Paris: Univer-
sité de la Sorbonne Nouvelle, 1984, Vol. 2, 9–68.
Nicholson, Peter. “The Two Versions of Sercambi’s Novelle.”
Italica, 53, 1976, pp. 210–213.
Petrocchi, Giorgio. “Il novelliere medievale del Sercambi.”
Convivium, 17, 1949.
Plaisance, Michel. “Les rapports ville campagne dans les
nouvelles de Sacchetti, Sercambi, et Sermini.” In Culture
et société en Italie du Moyen Age à la Renaissance. Paris:
Université de la Sorbonne Nouvelle, 1985, pp. 61–73.
Pratt, Robert A. “Chaucer’s Shipman’s Tale and Sercambi.”
Modern Language Notes, 55, 1940, pp. 142–145.
Salgarolo, David. “The Jews and Conversion in the Medieval and
Renaissance Italian Novella.” NEMLA Italian Studies, 11–12,
1987–1988, pp. 27–40.
Salwa, Piotr. “Il novelliere sercambiano e il suo contesto
lucchese.” Kwartalnik Neofilologiczny, 33(2), 1986, pp.
207–225.
––––. Narrazione, persuasione, ideologia: Una lettura del
“Novelliere”di Giovanni Sercambi, lucchese. Lucca: Maria
Paccini Fazzi Editore, 1991.
Swennen Ruthenberg, Myriam. “The Revenge of the Text:
The Real-Ideal Relationship between Giovanni Sercambi’s
Croniche and Novelliere.” Dissertation, New York University,
1994.
Vivarelli, Ann W. “Giovanni Sercambi’s Novelle and the
Legacy of Boccaccio.” Modern Language Notes, 90, 1975,
pp. 109–127.
Janet Levarie SmarrSERCAMBI, GIOVANNI