The Decameron by Giovanni Boccaccio. Translated by G.H. McWilliam. Franklin Library, 1981

The Decameron is a collection of 14th Century short stories. The tales are said to be told by a group of seven young women and three young men, taking refuge in an Italian villa outside Florence, in order to avoid the black death. The stories are split into 10 nights of storytelling over a two week period.

The Decameron by Giovanni Boccaccio. Translated by G.H. McWilliam. With the Woodcuts of José Narro.

Published by The Franklin Library, Pennsylvania, 1981. 

A near fine copy of this beautifully produced book. With black bonded leather spine, and ornate gilt decoration to grey cloth covered front and rear covers. Spine with raised bands and gilt tooling. With grey marbled endpapers and page ribbon. One small scuff mark to leather near tail of spine on the front.

Text is clean and bright, with full shiny gilt page edges. A most handsome volume. The only flaw to the text is that the first and last few leaves have a light ripple line on them, caused by a production flaw.

Beautifully illustrated by José Narro - these illustrations first appeared in a 1966 deluxe edition of El Decameron, published in Barcelona by Ediciones Nauta, S.A.

Text in English.

(Prelims) + 749pp.

Weight approximately 1360g (unpacked).

Dimensions approximately 240mm high x 170mm x 47mm.