The courtesan of the title, Fiammetta Bianchini is a young, seemingly independent, woman. At the beginning of the story, she lives in a rich house in Rome, under the auspices of one of the Pope's cardinals. The reader later discovers that she was brought to Rome by her mother when she was sixteen, so that her virginity could be auctioned off to the highest bidder. After that, she began work as a high-class courtesan, and continued to do so even after her mother returned to Venice several years ago. Fiammetta is extremely fierce and conniving, and appears to welcome the Spanish soldiers who invade her home to save herself. Later, when the Germans come, she pretends to convert to Protestantism and even cuts off all of her hair to prove her devotion. Nevertheless, she and Bucino escape to go to Venice, swallowing jewels to store their fortune in a portable way (another example of her cleverness). Only in her early twenties during the time of the story, Fiammetta still begins a new life in Venice, where she finds that her mother has died. With the help of an old "friend," whom she and Bucino blackmail, she sets herself up in business and is soon one of the most known courtesans of the region. However, at the end of the book, with the arrival of the "young" Fiammetta, we see that her fierce ambition may need to be tempered somewhat as the household must raise the girl.
