controversy, which cannot be regarded as even yet absolutely determined: the prevailing opinion, however, seems to be that it is a fabrication dating from about 1450. It is so entertaining that one would wish it trustworthy.
Gino Capponi, a leading Florentine citizen of the latter fourteenth and earlier fifteenth century, has left valuable memoirs of some of the transactions in which he was engaged. The great Florentine historian of the age, however, is Giovanni Villani, a characteristic embodiment of all the better qualities of his city, who, inspired by ardent patriotism, wrote its history, including a review of the contemporary transactions of the world, from the Tower of Babel to 1346, on the verge of the Black Death of 1348, by which he was himself carried off. His work was continued by his brother Matteo and his nephew Filippo to 1368. Villani possessed every qualification which experience of public business could afford, having filled several important offices, among them those of Prior and Master of the Mint. His language is exceedingly pure, his fidelity and impartiality are beyond suspicion, and he is peculiarly valuable from his preservation of financial and economical details, and other matters affecting ordinary life. He would have been a model historian if he had lived when the spirit of critical inquiry was awake, and historians had learned the delineation of character and the artistic construction of narrative; he must, however, in this case have forfeited the golden simplicity which renders his narrative so delightful. His nephew Filippo, who lived far into the fifteenth century, wrote in Latin the Lives of Illustrious Florentines, already cited as an authority on Dante. His memoir of Boccaccio has been frequently reprinted.
