Dante Alighieri

1
Dante Alighieri

• His life and his work
• The Divine Comedy. Inferno
• (Student example)

2
Dante Alighieris Life

• Born in Florence in Spring of 1265
• Member of the Florentine Guelphs
• One of two Florentine political classes
• Later split into the Blacks and the Whites
• Dante became a member of the Whites
• 1301, Blacks staged coup Dante exiled the next
  year

3
The Divine Comedy

• Politics in The Divine Comedy are religious and
  prophetic
• Dante wants to restore the conditions in which
  Christ first came the pax Romana
• For Dante, the Roman Empire was divinely ordained
• Once the earth is returned to that unity and
  order, Christs second coming would be possible

4
All parts are equal in Dante Alighieris eyes

• Three parts of The Divine Comedy are of equal
  length (taking into account the first canto of
  Inferno is a prologue)
• Inferno has 34 cantos
• Purgatorio and Paradiso contain 33 cantos
• Written in the verse style terza rima
• Rhyme scheme aba bcb cdc etc.

5
The
Divine
Inferno
Comedy
6
The journey into Hell

• Poem takes place on Good Friday in the year 1300
• Virgil comes up against three beasts Lion,
  leopard and she-wolf
• Virgil meets with Dante at the request of Dantes
  love, Beatrice
• Virgil and Dante pass through the gates of Hell
• "Lasciate ogne speranza, voi ch'intrate"
• "Abandon all hope, ye who enter here"

7
Circles One through Three of Hell

• Limbo
• Circle One
• Unbaptized and Virtuous Pagans
• Virgil, Homer, Horace, Ovid, Socrates, Plato
• Active, willed sins judged by Minos Circles Two
  through Five
• Circle Two
• Persons overcome by lust
• Paolo and Francesca
• Circle Three
• Gluttons
• Guarded by Cerberus
• Ciaco

Paolo Francesca
8
Circles Four and Five

• Circle Four
• Persons concerned with material possessions
• Guarded by Plutus
• Circle Five
• Wrathful persons
• River Styx and Phlegyas
• Filippo Argenti

9
Circle Six

• Lower Hell
• City of Dis surrounded by Stygian Marsh
• fallen angels, Furies and Medusa located here
• heavenly angel sent to permit passage into Lower
  Hell
• Circle Six
• Heretics
• Farinata degli Uberti and Cavalcante de
  Cavalcanti

10
Circle Seven

• Circle Seven
• Violent
• Guarded by Minotaur
• Outer Ring
• Violent against people and property
• Phlegethon and Centaurs
• Middle Ring
• Violent against self - Suicide (Suicide Forest)
• Pierre del Vigne
• Inner Ring
• Violent against God, Nature, and Art
• Brunetto Latini, Florentines Catello di Roso
  Gianfigliazzi, Paduans Reginaldo degli Scrovegni,
  Vitaliano di Iacopo Vitaliani

11
Circle Eight

• Circle Eight
• The fraudulent
• Malebolge
• Evil Pockets
• Divided into ten bolgia
• Bolgia One Panderers and Seducers
• Jason
• Bolgia Two Flatterers
• Bolgia Three Simony
• Pope Nicholas III

12
Circle Eight cont.

• Bolgia Four Sorcerers and false prophets
• Bolgia Five Barrators (corrupt politicians)
• Malacoda and the Malebranch
• Bolgia Six Hypocrites
• Catalano and Loderingo
• Bolgia Seven Thieves
• Centaur guard, Cacus
• Bolgia Eight Fraudulent Advisors
• Ulysses and Diomedes
• Guido da Montefeltro

13
Circle Eight cont.

• Bolgia Nine Sowers of Discord
• Sword wielding devil
• Muhammad
• Bolgia Ten Falsifiers
• Alchemists, counterfeiters, perjurers, and
  impersonators
• Afflicted by different diseases

14
Circle Nine of Hell

• Ringed by Giants
• Virgil and Dante set down by Antaeus
• Traitors are frozen in the lake, Cocytus
• Zone 1 Caina named for Cain
• Traitors of their kindred
• Zone 2 Antenora named for Antenor of Troy
• Traitors to political entity (ie, city, state or
  country)

15
Circle Nine cont.

• Zone 3 Ptolomaea named for Ptolomy
• Traitors to their guests
• Fra Alberigo
• Fiend possession of their bodies on Earth
• Zone 4 Judecca named for Judas
• Traitors to their lords and benefactors
• Encapsulated in ice
• Satan is located in this zone at the center

16
Circle Nine cont. Hell froze over

• Satan is three headed with three people in each
  mouth
• Center mouth contains Judas
• Betrayed Christ
• Left mouth contains Brutus
• Right mouth contains Cassius
• Brutus and Cassius betrayed Julius Caesar
• Perverted Trinity (The Divine Comedy)
• Satan is impotent, ignorant, and evil while God
  can be attributed as the opposite all powerful,
  all knowing, and good (The Divine Comedy).

17
Leaving Hell behind

• Virgil and Dante climb down Satan to leave Hell
• Emerging in other hemisphere before dawn on
  Easter Sunday

Dante gazes at Mount Purgatory
18
Works Cited
The Divine Comedy. October 20, 2007. Wikipedia,
the Free Encyclopedia. 2007.   lt
http//en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Divine_Comedygt  
Lawall, Sarah, ed. The Divine Comedy. Inferno.
The Norton Anthology of Western Literature.
8th ed. New York WW Norton Company, 2006.
1465-1576.
Lawall, Sarah, ed. Dante Alighieri. The
Norton Anthology of Western Literature. 8th
ed. New York WW Norton Company, 2006.
1465-1576. Slides One through Five come from
The Norton Anthology of Western Literature.
Slides Six through 17 are cited from The Divine
Comedy from the cited Wikipedia entry.
Picture sources from the following
sites http//www.bc.edu/bc_org/avp/cas/ashp/infer
no_purgatory_paradise_map.jpg http//www.yst.org/
images/yst/mask_drama.jpg http//www.biografiasyv
idas.com/biografia/d/fotos/ http//iws.ccccd.edu/
Andrade/BritLitI2322/images/NEWINF.GIF
http//www2.bc.edu/kellehbb/lava.jpg lava
image http//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/common
s/3/31/Gianciotto_Discovers_Paolo_and_Francesca_Je
an_Auguste_Dominique_Ingres.jpg http//upload.wiki
media.org/wikipedia/commons/b/ba/Dante03.jpg