Here is the
last eight cantos of Dante’s Inferno, you can read the previous ones here: CantoI – X, Canto XI – XVIII, Canto XIX – XXVI.
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| Lucifer, Dante & Virgil |
Canto XXVII: From another flame came
another voice, this time a soul from Romagna. Dante told him that Romagna
wasn’t at war, but has been under tyranny’s power. As he’s sure that Dante will
never leave the Hell to share his secret, the soul confided about himself to
Dante. He was Guido da Montefeltro, formerly lived a tricky life, before he
repented and became a Franciscan priest. But Pope Boniface intrigued him to
fight Christians by promising him an advanced absolution before he committed
sin, which Guido accepted. When he died, the devils took him of thievery, as absolution could not be
received before committing a sin.
Canto XXVIII: Dante described terrible
wounds suffered by souls in the ninth
pouch which surpassed any other wounds from great wars. Their bodies were
split open by the devil’s sword from chin to lower abdomen that their entrails
hung between their legs; and when their bodies were closed again, they would be
ripped open again and again. One of the souls was Mahomet who had been sowers
of scandal and schism; and because of the division they had caused, their bodies were thus split as a
punishment. Mahomet and other souls also sent their warning to them who still
lived on earth.
Canto XXIX: Virgil reprimanded Dante as
he was so absorbed to what he was watching that he didn’t notice a soul (his
cousin) who had died unavenged, called on him. And so Virgil and Dante have
reached the bottom of the eight circle: the
tenth pouch, where Dante heard piercing groans, a place to punish forgers. The souls here were very sick;
and they were languishing in scattered heaps, lying or crawling. Two of them
had their bodies full of itchy scabs which they scratched incessantly without
end. One of them had deceived someone by gaining money for teaching the other
to fly, and thus he was condemned by practicing
alchemy. This was the first of four zones in the tenth pouch:
the punishment for falsifiers of metals.
Canto XXX: Entering the second zone of ten pouch, Dante
recalled Greek myth stories of how men could treat each others like animals.
One soul, Myrrah, disguised as another person to be able to commit incest with
her father. These people had sinned of falsifier
of other’s person. Some from third
zone also mingled here; the sinners of falsifier
of coin, represented by Master Adam—a Florentine money counterfeiter who
produced coins with St. John Baptist’s stamp—whose punishment was being
eternally thirsty. A woman, who
falsely accused a man of seducing her, was placed in the fourth zone for falsifier of
words (liars). The souls here were punished with burning fever. Dante was spellbound by the scenes and was eager to
listen to them, which Virgil reprimanded as a vulgar desire.
Canto XXXI: Dante and Virgil were on
the bank of the eighth circle. Dante saw high towers through the thick mist,
which turned out to be Giants who stood on the pit. Their navels were on the
same level as the eight circle, while their lower bodies were on the ninth
circle, at the bottom of the Hell. One of them, Nimrod, had helped building the Tower of Babel and spread confusion
of different language throughout the world. Then they met Antaeus, whom Virgil
persuaded to carry them in the Giant’s hands to be lowered to the ninth circle, where traitors were punished.
Canto XXXII: Dante tried to describe
the horror of the lowest part of the pit in the ninth circle. It was a frozen lake—Cocytus—whose surface was
like thick glass because of the terrible coldness. The sinners sat in the ice,
frozen, with their teeth chattering. On the first ring, Caina (from
Cain), Dante met two souls compressed together head to head in the frozen ice,
butting their heads in rage; they were traitors
to their kin. In the second ring (Antenora), Dante accidentally kicked the
head of a soul which turned out to be Bocca’s,
who was punished as traitors to their
homeland or party. Then Dante saw two souls, savagely gnawing each other’s
head in hatred, and Dante interrogated them.
Canto XXXIII: The two souls were Count
Ugolino who was imprisoned without food by Archbishop Ruggieri. Ugolino was
imprisoned with his sons, so when the sons died, he ate their fleshes out of
hunger. Dante and Virgil forwarded to the third
ring (Ptolomaea) where Dante felt
a cold breeze, and Virgil said they were about to find the source. Here souls
were lying in the ice, only their heads protruded from it; the punishment for traitors to their guests. They still
lived on earth, but so great their sins were, that their soul must suffer in
Hell before they died, while their bodies on earth were taken over by demons.
Canto XXXIV: Now Dante and Virgil
arrived at the lowest bottom of the Hell, the fourth ring of the ninth circle (Juddeca). Through the thick mist Dante saw a tall figure such as a
mill which breathed cold wind which he could not figured out the source. Under
his feet, souls were completely buried in the ice in various positions. Then
Dante saw Lucifer the Satan, a three
headed enormous giant with three mouths and three enormous wings, from which
came the icy cold winds that freeze Cocytus. Each mouth held a sinner; they
were the traitors to their Benefactor,
the greatest sin of all. The teeth chewed their bodies ceaselessly without ever
killing them. In the first one was Judas
Iscariot who betrayed Jesus Christ; he was chewed head first while his legs
protruded from the mouth. In the second and third ones were Brutus and Cassius, both murdered Julius Caesar; their heads hanging downwards.
After these scenes, Virgil told Dante that he had seen all in Hell, and must
leave soon.
With efforts
Virgil climbed through Lucifer’s giant body to bring Dante and himself climbing
from the center of the earth. Dante was amazed to see Lucifer’s body now turned
upside down, and Virgil explained that they have passed the center of the
earth, and now they were on the ground again, where life was. When Lucifer fell
from Heaven, he thrust down into earth head first and stuck in the center; that
has made some changes even on the hemisphere too. But now, through hidden path
Virgil guided Dante to emerge to clear world where they saw stars glittering in
the sky again.
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