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Franco Sacchetti

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Franco (c. 1335 - c. 1400), Italian poet and novelist, was the son of Benci di Uguccione, surnamed "Buono," of the noble and ancient Florentine family of the Sacchetti (comp. Dante, Par. c. xvi.), and was born at Florence about the year 1335. While still a young man he achieved repute as a poet, and he appears to have travelled on affairs of more or less importance as far as to Genoa, Milan and "Ischiavonia." When a sentence of banishment was passed upon the rest of the house of Sacchetti by the Florentine authorities in 1380 it appears that Franco was expressly exempted, "per esser tanto uomo buono," and in 1383 he was one of the "eight," discharging the office of "prior" for the months of March and April. In 1385 he was chosen ambassador to Genoa, but preferred to go as podesta to Bibbiena in Casentino. In 1392 he was podesta of San Miniato, and in 1396 he held a similar office at Faenza. In 1398 he received from his fellow-citizens the post of captain of their then province of Romagna, having his residence at Portico. The date of his death is unknown; most probably it occurred about 1400, though some writers place it as late as 1410.

Sacchetti left a considerable number of sonnetti, canzoni, ballate, madrigals, &c., which have never been printed, but which are still extant in at least one MS. in the Laurentian library of Florence. His Novelle were first printed in 1724, from the MS. in the same collection, which, however, is far from complete. They were originally 300 in number, but only 258 in whole or in part now survive. They are written in pure and elegant Tuscan, and, based as they are for the most part on real incidents in the public and domestic life of Florence, they are valuable for the light they throw on the manners of that age, and occasionally also for the biographical facts preserved in them.