The Divine Comedy (Complete Annotated Edition). Dante Alighieri

without profit of their toil.

I slung the fatal noose6 from my own roof.”

      Footnotes

1 A wild and woody tract, abounding in deer, goats, and wild boars. Cecina is a river not far to the south of Leghorn; Corneto, a small city on the same coast, in the patrimony of the Church.

2 “I it was.” Piero delle Vigne, a native of Capua, who from a low condition raised himself, by his eloquence and legal knowledge, to the office of Chancellor to the Emperor Frederick II. The courtiers, envious of his exalted situation, forged letters to make Frederick believe that he held a secret and traitorous intercourse with the Pope, who was then at enmity with the Emperor. He was cruelly condemned to lose his eyes. Driven to despair by his unmerited calamity he dashed out his brains against the walls of a church, in the year 1245.

3 Lano, a Siennese, who being reduced by prodigality to a state of extreme want, found his existence no longer supportable; and having been sent by his countrymen on a military expedition to assist the Florentines against the Aretini, took that opportunity of exposing himself to certain death, in the engagement which took place at Toppo, near Arezzo. See G. Villani, Hist. lib. vii. c. cxix.

4 Jacopo da Sant’ Andrea, a Paduan, who, having wasted his property in the most wanton acts of profusion, killed himself in despair.

5 “——— Florence, that city which changed her first patron Mars for St. John the Baptist.”

6 “I slung the fatal noose.” We are not informed who this suicide was; some calling him Rocco de’ Mozzi, and others Lotto degli Agli.

      Canto XIV

       Table of Contents

      ARGUMENT.—They arrive at the beginning of the third of those compartments into which this seventh circle is divided. It is a plain of dry and hot sand, where three kinds of violence are punished; namely, against God, against Nature, and against Art; and those who have thus sinned, are tormented by flakes of fire, which are eternally showering down upon them. Among the violent against God is found Capaneus, whose blasphemies they hear. Next, turning to the left along the forest of self-slayers, and having journeyed a little onward, they meet with a streamlet of blood that issues from the forest and traverses the sandy plain. Here Virgil speaks to our Poet of a huge ancient statue that stands within Mount Ida in Crete, from a fissure in which statue there is a dripping of tears, from which the said streamlet, together with the three other infernal rivers, are formed.

      SOON as the charity of native land

      Wrought in my bosom, I the scatter’d leaves

      Collected, and to him restor’d, who now

      Was hoarse with utt’rance. To the limit thence

      We came, which from the third the second round

      Divides, and where of justice is display’d

      Contrivance horrible. Things then first seen

      Clearlier to manifest, I tell how next

      A plain we reach’d, that from its sterile bed

      Each plant repell’d. The mournful wood waves round

      Its garland on all sides, as round the wood

      Spreads the sad foss. There, on the very edge,

      Our steps we stay’d. It was an area wide

      Of arid sand and thick, resembling most

      The soil that erst by Cato’s foot was trod.

      Vengeance of Heav’n! Oh! how shouldst thou be fear’d

      By all, who read what here my eyes beheld!

      Of naked spirits many a flock I saw,

      All weeping piteously, to different laws

      Subjected: for on the’ earth some lay supine,

      Some crouching close were seated, others pac’d

      Incessantly around; the latter tribe,

      More numerous, those fewer who beneath

      The torment lay, but louder in their grief.

      O’er all the sand fell slowly wafting down

      Dilated flakes of fire, as flakes of snow

      On Alpine summit, when the wind is hush’d.

      As in the torrid Indian clime, the son

      Of Ammon saw upon his warrior band

      Descending, solid flames, that to the ground

      Came down: whence he bethought him with his troop

      To trample on the soil; for easier thus

      The vapour was extinguish’d, while alone;

      So fell the eternal fiery flood, wherewith

      The marble glow’d underneath, as under stove

      The viands, doubly to augment the pain.

      Unceasing was the play of wretched hands,

      Now this, now that way glancing, to shake off

      The heat, still falling fresh. I thus began:

      “Instructor! thou who all things overcom’st,

      Except the hardy demons, that rush’d forth

      To stop our entrance at the gate, say who

      Is yon huge spirit, that, as seems, heeds not

      The burning, but lies writhen in proud scorn,

      As by the sultry tempest immatur’d?”

      Straight he himself, who was aware I ask’d

      My guide of him, exclaim’d: “Such as I was

      When living, dead such now I am. If Jove

      Weary his workman out, from whom in ire

      He snatch’d the lightnings, that at my last day

      Transfix’d me, if the rest be weary out

      At their black smithy labouring by turns

      In Mongibello, while he cries aloud;

      “Help, help, good Mulciber!” as erst he cried

      In the Phlegraean warfare, and the bolts

      Launch he full aim’d at me with all his might,

      He never should enjoy a sweet revenge.”

      Then thus my guide, in accent higher rais’d

      Than I before had heard him: “Capaneus!

      Thou art more punish’d, in that this thy pride

      Lives yet unquench’d: no torrent, save thy rage,

      Were to thy fury pain proportion’d full.”

      Next turning round to me with milder lip

      He