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This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.

Short Answer Questions

1. What does Frederico, now a poor man, determine to do when Monna Giovanna comes calling?

2. What does Gianni have the wife do before casting his spell?

3. What is Ricciardo's plan after Caterina makes her bed on the balcony?

4. What happens when Ricciardo learns of Caterina's love for him?

5. As they travel along, what do Rabatta and Bondone begin to do?

Short Essay Questions

1. What does the daughter of Messer Lizio di Valbona, a rich knight, do that her father knows nothing about?

2. When Monna Giovanna's son becomes seriously ill, what does he tell her might make him better?

3. How does the affair between Caterina and Ricciardo work itself out?

4. When collecting alms from a nearby village, what does Brother Onion use to get the people to give freely?

5. What plan does Caterina devise in order to be with Ricciardo?

6. When two of Brother Onion's friends see him in the village proclaiming he will show a feather from the angel Gabriel, what do they plan to do?

7. What happens that Don Gianni declares has broken the spell to change Pietro's wife into a mare?

8. What unusual thing causes Peronella and her lover to look for a place to hide him?

9. How does Brother Onion recover when he takes the charcoal out of the box instead of the feather?

10. Why do several nuns come to the Abbess' door in the middle of the night?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Write an essay of at least two typewritten, double spaced pages on the topic, The Sin of Getting Caught. Use examples from THE DECAMERON to show how the thing people are often sorriest for is that of getting caught. Contrast Peronella and Brother Alberto to show how getting caught is what brings a person down.

Essay Topic 2

Write an essay of at least two typewritten, double spaced pages on the topic, Attitudes About the Morality of the Clergy. In your essay point out from THE DECAMERON how it is assumed that many if not most of the clergy are morally remiss in having affairs. Compare this to modern times when clergy have been brought down because of their moral indiscretions.

Essay Topic 3

Write an essay of at least two typewritten, double spaced pages on the topic, Women as the Weaker Sex in THE DECAMERON. Use at least three different examples of how women are seen as inferior to men and more susceptible to moral transgression than men as seen in the book. Discuss how this idea not only plays out in the tales but also in the acceptance of the women gathered in the group of story tellers.

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