Note 221 — Chapter V
Reading edition
In the French romance on which the Filocolo is founded the hero on his return imposes Christianity on his people, and those who will not be converted he burns and massacres. Boccaccio has none of this barbarism. Italy has never understood religious persecution. It has always been imposed on her from outside—by Spain, for instance. I do not forget the rubrics de hereticis in so many of the Statutes of the free Communes.