Examines Boccaccio's pivotal role in legitimizing the vernacular literature of Dante, Petrarch and Cavalcanti through argument, narrative and transcription. Introduction: Boccaccio between Dante and Petrarch: cultivating vernacular literary community in the Chigi codex 1. Dante's dirty feet and the limping republic: Boccaccio's defense of literature in the Vita di Dante 2. Dante's shame and Boccaccio's paratextual praise: editing the Vita nuova, Commedia, and canzoni distese 3. The making of Petrarch's vernacular Book of Fragments (Fragmentorum liber) 4. The inventive scribe: glossing Cavalcanti in the Chigi and Decameron 6.9 Epilogue: the allegory of the vernacular: Boccaccio's Esposizioni and Petrarch's Griselda.