We come now to the very lip of the deepest pit in Hell. This is the completion of the final circle or bolgia where one finds the rest of the falsifiers: of words, of persons, of money. Altogether we will have looked at Alchemists, the Impersonators, the Counterfeiters and the Liars. It is a bit of leftover soup or kitchen stockpot where more and more is added to be sure that nothing is left out. There are many points of comparison and some fascinating lessons to be learned here. I will assume, yet again, that anyone who has stumbled across this odd blog of mine is interested enough in Dante to be actually reading the primary material with a properly annotated guide, such as translations by John Ciardi, Dorothy Sayers, Robert Pinsky or Robert and Jean Hollander.
At this last stop before descending to see Satan himself, we are reminded yet again of the moral geography of the Inferno. The sins proscribe and determine the punishment. However, here the punishment arises from within each sinner. There is no falling fire, buffeting wind or boiling pitch to create the suffering. There are no leaden capes or fiery tombs or demons with pitchforks or whips or swords to provide the punishment. In point of fact, everything is accomplished by the sinners themselves, to themselves or each other. They chase each other rather than running from fire or demons. They attack each other with their own teeth or with words or with fists. There is not a guard to be found. There is no need. Fraud is the guard and the punishment, destroying human integrity and society from within, causing it to deteriorate, like a diseased body because of its failing health. Once again we are reminded that for Dante, and of course the Christian Ethic, we are all our brothers’ and sisters’ keepers. That which we do is not in secret, but affects the greater good and destroys community, trust and the general Body of Christ.
Much of this Canto is driven by the comparison of animal behavior and madness. The very beginning is an elaborate classical example of two figures who lose their humanness to exhibit madness in the form of fierce attacks or complete loss of rationality: becoming beast-like. Athamas in line 4 is driven mad, calls his wife a lioness, his twin boys are cubs and then he reaches out with “pitiless claws” to destroy them…
4 Athamas went so raving mad that when he saw
5 his wife come near with both their children,
6 holding one on this arm, one on that,
7 he shouted: "Let's spread the nets so I can trap
8 the lioness with her cubs as they go past!"
9 Then he reached out and with pitiless claws
10 he seized the one who was called Learchus,
11 whirled him round and dashed him on a rock.
The animal similes continue with Hecuba, finding that her daughter had been sacrificed on Achilles’ grave and her son was murdered by the man who had promised to protect him. She then descended from grief into complete madness—barking like a dog:
16 Hecuba -- wretched, sorrowing, a captive --
17 when she saw Polyxena slaughtered and,
18 grieving woman, when she saw
19 Polydorus lying dead upon the shore,
20 went mad and started barking like a dog,
21 so greatly had her grief deranged her mind.
Dante the Poet then abruptly switches from flowing, beautifully written classical poetry to brutal language describing abrupt action. Here we find two others who also are mad and, like animals, attacking, biting, snapping jaws and creating havoc. Both sinners were impersonators of others in order to gain possessions or satisfy forbidden lust. Once again, when one’s own desires lead to destruction of trust and truth, then the very structure of society is destroyed and even the structure of one’s own mind collapses. There indeed is a moral order that, if not followed, will have repercussions far and wide.
Another attack in this Canto is the polar opposite of the…
25 …two pallid, naked shades I saw,
26 snapping their jaws as they rushed up
27 like swine charging from an opened sty.
Here in this early example there is movement and leaping and snapping of jaws and dragging of bodies. The next two however are prone, fixed and immobile. One is so obese he is unable to move an inch. [Indeed his very body is described as a land mass.] The other is so filled with fever that steam rises off him and gives off a rank smell. Yet the attack and fight of these two is just as fierce as the first one in this Canto. They attack each other first with fists then with words. And Dante the Pilgrim listens with fascination to the cut and thrust of their taunts and ripostes. In fact, during Dante’s time, this was considered an art to be able to debate at a high level, whether in politics or academics or private argument. Dante the Poet, indeed, had written in some of his earlier work, before his exile from Florence, about his fine ability to think on his feet and respond with a cutting remark. Hence, perhaps his eager listening to their back and forth argument was not simply a Medieval Jerry Springer show, but rather one rhetorician listening for clues from two others in the heat of battle.
It might also be noted, however, that one of the stated reasons for this journey through Hell was for Dante the Pilgrim to observe all forms of sin, so that HE MIGHT AVOID THEM in the rest of his life. If that is the case, then perhaps Virgil was wrong to chastise Dante the Pilgrim so harshly. Regardless, however, lessons were learned and now the two are ready to descend to the lowest portion of Hell. We are at the last stage of the journey in the Inferno.