El cuento de Cerciapelleto : apuntes sobre la primera traducción castellana del Decamerón

The essay analizes the first tale of the Decameron in its spanish translation from the 15th-century, fixing the text in a temporary way and trying to describe the translators’ modus operandi. In order to establish a viable text the only conserved manuscript is used, the escurialense J-II-21, and the impreso toledano from 1524, derived from the editio princeps of Sevilla in 1496, which all date back to the same archetype. The variants of the two texts are compared to the edition of Boccaccio’s work, taking into account especially the Paris manuscript, which, together with other codices, represents a “form” previous to the definitive one, and was the one with the most immediate success, being translated in French and Catalan as well. In the literary analysis a scheme of ten types of interventions by the anonymous Castilian author, voluntary and involuntary, is proposed, and four general conclusions.