Dante Alighieri was born in Florence, Italy in 1265 and wrote The Divine Comedy, considered one of the greatest works of world literature. The Comedy is divided into three parts - Inferno, Purgatorio, and Paradiso - that describe Dante's journey through hell, purgatory, and heaven. In Inferno, Dante is guided through the nine circles of hell by the Roman poet Virgil. The circles are reserved for non-believers, lustful, gluttonous, greedy, wrathful, heretics, violent, fraudulent, and traitors. Each circle inflicts punishments appropriate to the sins punished there.

1. Welcome to
HELL!

2. The Divine Comedy by Dante
Alighieri- Only copy the notes
 Dante’s Background
 Born in Middle Ages
Florence in 1265
 Married Gemma
Donati and had three
children
 Two boys-exiled; one
daughter who was sent
to convent
 Died in Ravenna in
1321

3. Dante’s Career
 Dante’s career started in 1295
 There were two ruling families in Florence
 The Guelphs—friends of the Pope
 The Ghibellines—supporters of the
Germanic emperor
 The families battled repeatedly for power

4. Dante’s Career 2
 The Guelphs were in power; the Ghibellines were
exiled
 The Gulphs had a major fight from within and split
into two groups—the whites and blacks
 The blacks staged a coup sending Dante ad all the
whites into permanent exile
 Dante remained in exile for the rest of his life for
graft and hostility against the Pope
 Dante’s fortunes were confiscated—he lived off of
friends for remainder of his life

5. Writing Career
 Was angered over injustices to his life
 He wanted it clarified what was good—what
was evil
 He was bored and began to explore concerns
in writing
 Wrote The Comedy of Dante Alighieri,
Florentine by Citizenship, Not by Morals.

6. The Characters
 Dante
 Is a sinner who has wandered from the right road and must
get back
 Has fallen prey to seven deadly sins: (don’t need to copy sins)
 Pride
 Envy
 Wrath
 Acedia (laziness/sloth)
 Avarice (greed)
 Gluttony
 Lust
 Dante must compensate for laziness.
 If he can overcome his sin, so can you (his message!)

7. Virgil
 Why did Dante choose Virgil as his guide through hell?
 Virgil knew hell well as described in his book The
Aeneid.
 Virgil foretold the coming of Christ and was seen as a
mystic who could predict the future, manipulate spirits.
 He created the mythology that explained the Roman
Empire.
 Virgil stands for human reason.

8. Beatrice
 Dante met her at age 9 and fell in love with her
 Beatrice was married to an older man
 Dante only saw her a few times
 She was the embodiment of the spiritually pure
 She died at a young age and this sent Dante into a
depression
 Beatrice sent Virgil to bring Dante out of hell and
purgatory in hopes that he can reach heaven

9. Dante’s Beliefs
 Religion:
 Believed in one church, the Roman Catholic
Church
 Believed in heaven, purgatory, and hell

10. Dualities:
 Believed that two extreme opposites exist in most things.
 Power of church versus power of state
 Philosophy versus religion
 Plato versus Aristotle (look for both in this work)
 Animals versus man versus angels
 Realism versus symbolism
 Common language versus elegant language

11. Physical world:
 Believed in Ptolemy’s view of the universe or that the
planets circle the earth:
 Earth
 Moon
 Venus
 Sun
 Mars
 Jupiter
 Saturn
 Starry Heaven
 Crystalline Heavens
 Home of God

12. Education
 Bible and St. Augustine
 Classic Greek and Myths

13. The Plot
 This is Dante’s journey through hell in his attempt
to get to heaven
 There are three canticles: hell, purgatory, and
heaven.
 See map

14. Setting
 Hell is a medieval hierarchy, a huge funnel shaped
pit that occupies the center of the earth.
 Hell is established around Dante’s vision of it.
Dante believes man has free will and gets what he
has chosen
 Hell is an individual’s potential for sin

15. Form
 Comedy- has a positive ending
 Epic- long narrative poem of a grand scale
involving superhuman upon who the world (or a
nation) depends
 A Quest- a journey to achieve a prize or
knowledge-wisdom

16. Language and Style
 First to write an epic in Italian, not Latin
 First to combine low, bawdy language with
elevated poetic language
 First to consciously use obscene language

17. Themes
 The whole world has meaning, reason, and
order
 The source of meaning, reason, and order is
God’s divine plan.
 The divine order is knowable and achievable
by humankind.
 In sum if you’ll just be good, you can make it
to the top or heaven.

18. HELL:
Vestibule: The uncommitted
Neither Good nor evil- only for themselves
Living in maggots

19. Acheron
River
Charon- A monster takes
him across

20. Circle 1 (Limbo): Virtuous
unbaptized
 Not tormented
 Pagans
 Virgil joins Dante here
 Others include:
 Homer
 Horace
 Ovid

21. Circle II: Lustful
 You’ll be reading Canto 5 for the
punishment in this level.
 Includes:
 Helen, Achilles, and Paris
 Tristan and Isolte
 Paolo and Francesca
 Cleopatra

22. Circle III: Gluttonous
 3 headed dog Cerberus chasing souls
around and eating them
 Stinking snow and freezing rain fall
 A gigantic garbage dump

23. Circle IV: Prodigal, Avaricious
 Hoarders vs. wasters
 Carrying dead weight that they push back
and forth between themselves
 Plutus- monster who whips them

24. Circle V (Styx): Wrathful
 The river Styx
 Constantly fighting
 Buried under slim
 Pop bubbles so they can speak

25. Walls of the City of Dis
 Furies
 Rebellious Angels
 Medusa
 Split between upper and lower Hell

26. Circle VI: Heretics
 Violence to God
 Vast cemetery
 Coffins inflamed by fire

27. Circle VII: Violent against Neighbors
Violent against Themselves
Violent against God, Nature, and Art
 Suicides trapped in trees- branches broke to
speak and bleed- causes pain
 A river of boiling blood
 Harpies picking people apart
 Burning sand- slow rain
 Minotaur eating people

28. Abyss
 A water fall over a cliff
 Hell becomes frozen after this

29. Circle VIII: (Malebolge):
 Evil ditches- or trenches that must be crossed
 Solg’s
 The ten ditches of the Malebolge, in descending
order, are listed thus: Bolgia One: Panderers and
Seducers are punished here. They are forced to
march, single file around the circumference of their
circle, constantly lashed by horned demons.
 Bolgia Two: Sinners guilty of excessive flattery
are punished in this bolgia, immersed forever in a
river of human excrement.

30. Circle VIII: (Malebolge): continued
 Bolgia Three: Simonists (sinners guilty of selling
church offices for personal gain) are punished
here. They are turned upside down in large
baptismal fonts cut into the rock, with their feet set
ablaze by oily fires. The heat of the flames burns
according to the guilt of the sinner.
 Bolgia Four: Astrologists, seers, sorcerers and
others who attempted to pervert God’s laws to
divine the future are punished here. Their heads
have been twisted around to face backwards, and
thus they are forced to walk backwards around the
circumference of their circle for all of time.

31. Circle VIII: (Malebolge): continued
 Bolgia Five: Grafters (peculators, extortionists, blackmailers and
unscrupulous businessmen: sinners who used their positions in life to
gain personal wealth or other advantages for themselves) are punished
by being thrown into a river of boiling pitch and tar. In addition, should
any of the grafters try to escape the pitch, a horde of demons
("Malebranche", meaning "evil claws") armed with grappling hooks and
barbs stands guard over them, ready to tear them to pieces.
 Bolgia Six: Hypocrites are punished in this circle. They are forced to
wear heavy lead robes as they walk around the circumference of their
circle. The robes are golden and resemble a monk’s cowl but are lined
with heavy lead, symbolically representing hypocrisy. Also, Caiphas,
the Pharisee who insisted on the execution of Jesus, is crucified in this
circle, staked to the ground so that the ranks of the lead-weighted
hypocrites march across him.

32. Circle VIII: (Malebolge): continued
 Bolgia Seven: This bolgia houses the souls of thieves. The bolgia is
also filled with serpents, dragons and other vengeful reptiles that
torture the thieves endlessly. The bites of some of the snakes cause
the thieves to spontaneously combust, only to regenerate their bodies
for further torment in a few moments. Other thieves are denied human
forms and appear as reptiles themselves, and can only assume their
true shape if they steal a human shape from another sinner; this
involves a very painful transformation for both souls involved.
 Bolgia Eight: In this trench, the souls of Deceivers who gave false or
corrupted advice to others for personal benefit are punished. They are
constantly ablaze, appearing as nothing so much as living, speaking
tongues of flame.

33. Circle VIII: (Malebolge): continued
 Bolgia Nine: Sinners who, in life, promoted scandals, schism, and discord
are punished here; particularly those who caused schism within the church
or within politics. They are forced to walk around the circumference of the
circle bearing horrible, disfiguring wounds inflicted on them by a great
demon with a sword. The nature of the wound mirrors the sins of the
particular soul; while some only have gashes, or fingers and toes cut off,
others are decapitated, cut in half (as schismatics), or are completely
disemboweled. In the Inferno, Muslim prophet Muhammad is tortured in
this ditch.
 Bolgia Ten: Falsifiers, those who attempted to alter things through lies or
alchemy, or those who tried to pass off false things as real things, such as
counterfeiters of coins, are punished here. This bolgia has four
subdivisions where specific classes of falsifiers (alchemists, impostors,
counterfeiters, and liars) endure different degrees of punishment based on
horrible, consumptive diseases such as rashes, dropsy, leprosy and
consumption.
 The lower edge of Malebolge is guarded by a ring of titans and earth
giants, many of whom are chained in place as punishment for their
rebellion against the gods. Beyond and below the giants lies Cocytus,
hell's final depth.

34. Giants Well
 Frozen and angry Giants who try to kill
Dante

35. Circle IX (Cocytus): Traitors
 To kindred, To country, To Guests, To Masters
 In Inferno, the first cantica of Dante's The Divine Comedy, Cocytus is the
ninth and lowest circle of Hell. Cocytus is referred to as a frozen lake
rather than a river, although it originates from the same source as the
other infernal rivers. The lake is frozen by the flapping wings of Lucifer, or
Satan; his tears replenish the lake, and are then frozen by his attempts to
escape via the wings. It is divided into four descending "rounds," or
sections:
 Caina, after the Biblical Cain; traitors to blood relatives.
 Antenora, after Antenor from the Iliad; traitors to country.
 Ptolomea, after Ptolemy, governor of Jericho, who murdered his guests (1
Maccabees); traitors to guests.
 Judecca, after Judas Iscariot; traitors to masters and benefactors.
 Lucifer is at the center of the circle, his lower body trapped in ice, and is
depicted with three mouths. One mouth gnaws on Brutus and another on
Cassius, the leading conspirators against Julius Caesar, and both are
chewed feet foremost with their heads protruding. The chewed head of
Judas is in the third mouth.

36. Works Cited
 Alegheri, Dante. The Inferno. Trans. John
Ciardi. New York: Penguin, 1982.
 “Inferno.” Encyclopedia Reference.
Ask.com. Keyword: “Inferno.” 30 Oct.
2008. http://www.reference.com