Dante’s Inferno

The Details of Hell

 Dante Alighieri
 Excommunicated from the Roman
Catholic Church.
 Exiled from his home, Florence, Italy.

 Authored The Divine Comedy, an epic

poem split into three parts: The Inferno

(Hell), Purgatorio (Purgatory), and
Paradiso (Paradise)
 Allegory
 “Is the discussion of one subject by disguising
it as another which resembles the first in some
striking way.”
 Derived from Dante’s last name
 In an allegory the characters, setting and plot

have a hidden or symbolic meaning beyond

their literal meaning.
 An Allegory teaches a moral lesson.

Virgil
Roman author of The Aeneid, the national
epic of Rome.
 Virgil is Dante’s guide through Hell.

 “forbids me to come there…” Virgil lived

and died before the establishment of

Christ’s teachings in Rome and cannot
 The Inferno
 The Inferno is a telling of Dante’s journey
through the nine circles of Hell.
 Dante begins his journey through Hell on
Good Friday and ends on Easter Sunday.
 This symbolizes the journey of Jesus,
crucified on Good Friday, descended into Hell
and was resurrected to live again on Easter
 The Nine Circles of Hell
 Circle 1- LIMBO
 Circle 2- The Lustful
 Circle 3- The Gluttonous Circles 2-5 are
Sins without
Malice.
 Circle 4- Misers and Spendthrifts They do not hurt
others.
 Circle 5- Wrathful and Sullen
 Circle 6- Heretics
 Circle 7- The Violent (Murder & Suicide)
 Circle 8- The Fraudulent
 Circle 9- Traitors
 Circle I- LIMBO
 Fallen Angels- race endlessly after a blank flag;
These are the fallen angels who took no stand for
or against the rebellious angels during the War in
Heaven between Lucifer and God.
 They are now forced to run after a black banner

or flag because they chose no banner to support

in the war of Heaven. The race after the flag
without stopping for eternity.
 Also in Circle I
THE INNOCENT SOULS:
 Blameless but un-baptized babies

 Old Testament patriarchs (Noah, Abraham, Moses, etc.)

 Great Pagan and Roman poets and philosophers

comfortable (living in a castle) but separate forever

from God.
 Though they are in Hell, these souls live in relative
comfort. The only sin they committed was not being
baptized as a Christian.
 Circle II- The Lustful
 The second circle is the real beginning of hell. Here we
see a giant tornado, sinners are whirled by winds as in
life they were helpless in tempests of passion.
 Paolo and Francesca go swirling by in Canto 5. They
were murdered before they could repent carnal courtly
love as sin. (Dido, Cleopatra, Anthony and Achilles are
all also here)
 These are all sinners of LUST and CARNAL/SEXUAL
LOVE
 Other Historic Lovers in Circle 2
 Dido – Queen of Carthage/Lover of Aeneas

 Cleopatra- Queen of Egypt/Lover of Mark

Anthony
 Helen- Princess of Greece/Troy/Lover of Paris

 Polyxena- Princess of Troy/Lover of Achilles

 Isolde- Princess of Ireland/Lover of Tristan

These lovers and more have been swept up in the Tornado of their passion endlessly reaching for
each other, yet eternally kept apart by the winds of Hell.
 Circle III- The Gluttonous
 These are the sinners of EXCESS.
 People who eat too much, take too many drugs, drink
too much…
 This circle is guarded by Cerberus (from Greek
Mythology, he is the 3 headed dog who guarded the
entrance to the Greek Underworld)
 Gluttons who feasted away their lives now lie like pigs
in the mud while the three headed dog takes him time
eating them- forever.
 Circle IV- Misers and Spendthrifts
 Misers are generally cheap old men who hoard
their money, like Ebenezer Scrooge.
 Spendthrifts are people who spend too much

money.
 Pluto, Roman god of riches, guards the entrance
to the fourth circle.
 Sinners take turns rolling stones at each other to

crash against one another- FOREVER.

 Circle V- Wrathful and Sullen
 The Wrathful sought Revenge in life while the Sullen
were silently angry and made others miserable with
that anger.
 The Styx (river of hate) forms a swamp holding the
openly wrathful who strike and bite one another; the
sullen lie under the surface of the marsh, just as their
silent anger lay hidden during their lives.
 Dante wrote The Divine Comedy as a form of revenge
against those that would send him into exile; this was
his sin, which is why revenge is not one of the more
extremely punished sins.
 Circle VI- The Heretics
 Heretics choose their own opinions instead of
following the teachings of the Church.
 Heretics are anyone who commits any crime

against the church. They get to spend eternity set

on fire and then buried alive. Their bodies forever
burning in their graves.
 Atheists, or those who don’t believe in God, are
also here.
 Circle VII- Violence
 Violent Sinners are divided into 3 sub-circles:
 Violent against Neighbors
 Violent against Self
 Violent against God

 First Ring: Violence against others; includes murderers and

robbers - NOTE: Dante does not really distinguish between
lives and property; stealing a life is the same to Dante as
stealing someone’s property. The damned are submerged in
the Phlegethon – the river of blood, drowning in the blood of
 Second Ring: Violence against themselves - suicides
(wasted their bodies) and squanderers (wasted their
goods)
 Suicides (with harpies) - Harpies in Greek Mythology

steal anything, so here they symbolize stealing away of

the souls by suicides, they puck out the eyes of their
victims. Eyes are the gateway to the soul.
 Third Ring: Violence against God - blasphemy and

denial; the worst kind of violence in Dante's world-

view. Blasphemy can be anything- from denouncing
God before a crowd of people to saying the Lord’s
 Monsters as Guards
 Yet another Greek Mythological reference
mentioned in The Inferno is the character of
Chiron – the centaur teacher of Hercules.
 Warrior-centaurs patrol this entire circle; they
are half man, half horse and easily angered;
they patrol & torture those who killed others
violently.
 Circle VIII- Fraud
 There are ten different sub-circles of Fraud.
 1.Panderers/Seducers (those who tell you what you want to hear to get
something from you)
 2.Flatterers
 3.Simoniacs (sell church favor)
 4.Fortunetellers
 5.Grafters (sell political favor)
 6.Hypocrites
 7.Thieves
 8.Evil Counselors
 9.Sowers of Discord
 10.Falsifiers (Alchemists & Counterfeiters)
 The Fraud Monster- a reference to the Serpent
Archetype
 The Circle of Fraud starts at the base of an abyss, so Dante
and Virgil must descend on the back of the Fraud Monster,
Geryon.
 Geryon has a pleasant face and a snake-like body, to
symbolize the pleasant first appearance of fraud and its
twisted snake-like dealings.
 This is very much like the pleasant first appearance of the
snake in the Garden of Eden as the friend and advisor of Eve.
The snake gives a false appearance in order to trick Eve into
eating the apple.
 Circle IX- Traitors
 Dante was betrayed by his countrymen and fellow
politicians. This betrayal sent him into exile which is
why betrayal is considered the most serious sin in
Dante’s version of Hell.
 The 9th Circle of hell consists of a frozen lake of ice;
Satan is frozen from the shoulders down at the center.
Satan’s wings continuously flap as he tries to get free
from his frozen jail. The wind created by his wings is
what actually freezes the lake and makes the rest of the
circle cold.
 Satan
 Satan has three faces.
 In each mouth is a historic betrayer eternally being
chewed on.
 In mouth 1 and mouth 2 are Brutus and Cassius the

assassinators of Julius Caesar (considered the greatest

Roman leader who sacrificed his life for his country.)
 In Mouth 3 is Judas Iscariot who betrayed Jesus Christ
to his enemies. Christ was put to death sacrificing his
life for his people.
 They observe that Satan has three faces. This
is a gross parody of the Catholic Holy Trinity.
 Dante and Virgil have to actually climb

around Satan in order to reach the exit of Hell.

 This is the end of Dante’s journey through
Hell. Virgil must leave him at the bottom of
the mountain of Purgatory to climb up and out
of Hell alone.
 The final Circle of Hell is divided into 4 sub
circles:
 Traitors to Kindred or family- Caina named after Cain,
the first murderer of a kinsman
 Traitors to Country - Antenora; named after the Trojan

Antenor who in the Middle Ages was believed to have

betrayed Troy to the Greeks.
 Traitors to Guests - Ptolomea, named after Ptolemy, a
captain of Jericho who invited guests to a banquet and
then murdered them while they were eating.
 Traitors to Masters (or benefactors)
 - Judecca is where Satan is munching on Judas, Cassius
and Brutus
 Judecca is named for Judas Iscariot who betrayed
Christ. Also includes Cassius and Brutus who betrayed
Julius Caesar. This puts together the betrayal of
masters of Church and State.
 The frozen center contains Satan - total absence of
goodness; absolute distance from God; Virgil and
Dante climb down Satan's side to the center of the
 The Image of Stars
 As a part of the epic’s symbolism, Dante ends each of
the three parts of The Divine Comedy with the word
“stars.”
 Every conclusion of the upward soul is toward the
stars, God’s shining symbols of hope and virtue.
 At the end of each part in The Divine Comedy Dante
also travels upward in pursuit of his journey to
salvation.
 Further symbolism can be found in the mythological
names of the constellations. Further emphasizing the
Greek/Roman mythological influences in the work.