Dante’s
Inferno
Holbrook’s
Highway to Hell
No Speeding!
The Vestibule
Souls of the Indifferent;
the uncommitted
Punishment:
Run through wasps &
hornets while carrying
a banner
Soul here – Pontius Pilot
for making the great
refusal
River of Acheron:
River of Woe
Only the dead may
pass across this
river
Charon (from Greek
mythology) is the
boat keeper of the
Acheron
The Doomed Souls Embarking to Cross the Acheron
Gustave Doré
Limbo
Homer and the Classic Poets
Gustave Doré
• Those who came before
Christ
• The Unbaptized
Punishment –
No hope of seeing God
Always Melancholy
Souls Present –
Homer, Socrates, Virgil,
Plato, Aristotle, Ovid…
Judgment
• KING MINOS
• (formerly the ruler of Crete; a
son of Zeus)
Minos
Gustave Doré
– Decides the fate and
punishment of the
Dead
– Wraps his tail around a
sinner to tell him to
which circle he will be
going.
King Minos
Minos
William Blake
The Lustful
Sins of Lust
Punishment – Spin
within a
whirlwind for
eternity
Souls Here –
Cleopatra, Helen of
Troy, Paolo &
Francesca
Whirlwind of Lovers
by William Blake
The Lustful continued…
The Souls of Paola and
Francesca
Gustave Doré
(give the story here…)
The Gluttons
Producers of nothing
but garbage and offal
Punishment – live in a
mixture of stinking
snow & freezing rain
that forms a bile slush
(basically a giant
garbage dump)
Souls - Ciacco the Hog,
a citizen of Florence
Guardian – Cerberus:
3-headed dog of hell, stands
over the Gluttons
slavering over them.
Gluttony - 1 : excess in
eating or drinking
2 : greedy or excessive
indulgence
The Gluttons
Cerberus
•Cerberus presides
over the third circle
of Hell.
•He is prevented
from devouring
Virgil and Dante by
Virgil who distracts
the beast by feeding
him handfuls of
earth.
Cerebus
William Blake
The Gluttons: Circle 3
The Souls of the Gluttonous
Gustave Doré
The Gluttons…continued (more art)
The Gluttons Ciacco
Gustave Doré
Hoarders & Wasters
(Avaricious & Prodigal)
Those who are greedy &
those who are recklessly
extravagant.
Punishment – roll stones at
each other while
screaming, “Why
squander,” and “Why
grasp.”
Souls – You can’t recognize
anyone here because their
features were so dimmed
from fighting.
The Souls of the Avaricious
Gustave Doré
Avaricious & Prodigal
The Avaricious and the Prodigal
Gustave Doré
The Wrathful & the Sullen
People who are always
sad, resentful, angry,
etc.
Punishment:
The wrathful are
immersed in the marsh
of the Styx River
while fighting each
other
Punishment for the Sullen –
entombed under the mud
of the Styx River
Souls – Filippo Argenti,
who rises from the mud
and attacks the Virgil and
Dante
Wrathful & Sullen continued…
Virgil shows Dante the Souls of the Wrathful
Gustave Doré
Wrathful & Sullen (art)
The Stygian Lake,
with the Ireful
Sinners Fighting
William Blake
Wall of the City of Dis
Guarded by the
Furies and
Rebellious
Angels
A heavenly
messenger
opens the gate
to the city with
a poof!
The City of Dis and The Heretics
Botticelli
Wall of City of
Dis continued…
• Dante and Virgil have
to run past a scary
minotaur (a monster
shaped half like a man
and half like a bull)
The Minotaur on the Shattered Cliff
Gustave Doré
The Heretics
Sin - a baptized member
of the Roman Catholic
Church who disavows
a revealed truth
Punishment – Confined to
burning tombs
Souls – …
Guardians…
The Heretics
Botticelli
Violence Against
Neighbors
Punishment –
Immersed in River of
blood according to
the sinner’s degree of
guilt
Souls – Alexander the
Great, Attila the Hun The Violent against their Neighbour
Botticelli
Violence Against Oneself
(Suicides)
Punishment – Souls encased in
trees with Harpies pecking at
them. Those who destroy
their own bodies are denied
Human Forms.
Harpies are foul mythological
creatures that are part woman
& part bird.
Harpies in the Forest of the Suicides
Gustave Doré
Violence Against God
THREE TYPES:
• Blasphemers – stretched
on burning sand
• Sodomites – running on
burning sand
• Usurers – huddled on
burning sand & sit with
purses around their
necks (kind of like a
loan shark)
Souls – Brunetto Latini,
Dante’s former teacher
The Blasphemer
William Blake (British Museum)
Violence Against God
Circle 7: Ring 3
• Capaneus - one of the
seven kings who
besieged Thebes. He
defied Jupiter and was
killed by a thunderbolt.
Dante describes him as
lying proud and
disdainful, apparently
unaffected by the
flames.
Capaneus the Blasphemer
William Blake
Violence Against God,
Nature, and Art
Brunetto Latini accosts Dante
Gustave Doré
River Styx:
The River of Hate
Phlegyas ferries Dante and Virgil across the Styx
Gustave Doré
The Fraudulent:
Panderers &
Seducers
• Sin –
Panderers (to provide
gratification for others'
desires ) & Seducers (to
persuade to
disobedience or
disloyalty; sometimes
has to do with sexual)
• Punishment –
Whipped by devils
The Fraudulent:
Flatterers
• Punishment –
Covered with filth
• Souls Present
Jason and others
Definition - to praise
excessively especially
from motives of selfinterest
Paramours and Flatterers
Gustave Doré
The Fraudulent:
Simonists
• Simonists are people who
sell ecclesiastical favors (If
you pay me money, I’ll
make sure you get into
heaven.)
• Punishment – Turned upside
down with fire on their feet
• Souls present – Pope
Nicholas III - Pope from
1277 - 1280. Dante views
him as one who corrupted
church office.
The Simonists, by Gustave Doré
The Fraudulent:
Fortune Tellers
• Punishment – Their heads are
twisted and then turned
backwards
• Souls Present – Tieresias (the
blind prophet from Oedipus
and Antigone)
• Dante names seven souls in all,
one of them a woman, Manto,
after whom Virgil's birthplace
Mantua was named; one of the
men is probably her father
Tiresias. Virgil and Dante look
down from the rock bridge
above.
The Necromancers and Augurs
William Blake
The Fraudulent:
Corrupt Officials
•
Punishment – Covered by
boiling pitch (dirt/tar) and
harassed by 10 sneaky
demons
• This art scene is set in
the fifth chasm of the
eighth circle. Bonturo
Dati's fellow magistrate
is being carried by a
demon and is about to
be thrown into the
boiling pitch before
being attacked with
hooks.
The Devil Carrying the Lucchese Magistrate
to the Boiling-Pitch Pool of Corrupt Officials
William Blake
The Fraudulent:
Hypocrites
• Definition - a person
who puts on a false
appearance of virtue or
religion
• Punishment – Clothed in
leaden mantles (like a
cloak)
The Hypocrites
Gustave Doré
• Souls Present –
Caiaphas
The Fraudulent:
Thieves
• Punishment –
Trapped in a snake pit
with their hands
bound; then they
change into snakes
• Souls Present –
Vanni Fucci
Thieves
Gustave Doré
Thieves: Vanni Fucci
Vanni Fucci had been bitten by
a serpent, instantly transformed
into ashes, and then, like the
phoenix, reconstituted into his
former shape. This was his
punishment for robbing the
treasury of San Jacopo in the
Church of San Zeno, Pistoia, in
1293. Here Vanni Fucci
blasphemes against God with an
obscene gesture. The flames
rain down on him from the dark
cloud above and serpents renew
their attacks on him.
Vanni Fucci 'Making Figs' Against God
William Blake
The Fraudulent: Thieves
Here, the two
poets have
crossed over the
cliff into the
seventh chasm
of the eighth
circle, where
the Thieves are
punished by
serpents.
The Thieves and the Serpents
William Blake
The Fraudulent:
Evil Counselors
• Punishment –
Concealed in flames
• Souls Present –
Ulysses, Diomed,
Guido
Evil Counselors
Gustave Doré
Evil Counselors (art)
Virgil and Dante are now
in the eighth chasm of the
eighth circle, where the
punishment of Evil
Counselors occurs. The
figures are swathed in
individual flames, likened
by Dante to fireflies.
Ulysses and Diomed are
punished for deceiving the
Trojans with the Wooden
Horse.
Ulysses and Diomed Swathed in the Same Flame
William Blake
The Fraudulent:
Sowers of Discord
• Definition – (lack of
agreement or harmony
(as between persons,
things, or ideas) b :
active quarreling or
conflict resulting from
discord among persons
or factions : Strife)
• Punishment –
Physically torn apart,
wounded, and
mutilated
The Sowers of Discord
Gustave Doré
The Fraudulent:
Counterfeiters & Alchemists
• Punishment – diseased with all
kinds of deformities
•
The Pit of Disease: Gianni Schicchi and Myrrha
Dante sees two pale and naked
shadows rushing out biting like
hungry swine. One, Gianni
Schicchi, grabs Capocchio by the
neck with his fangs. Capocchio, is
probably the Florentine alchemist
who was burned alive in Sienna in
1281. The other animal-headed
figure on the left is Myrrha,
daughter of King Cinyras of
Cyprus with whom she had an
incestuous relationship.
by William Blake
Giant’s Well (art)
• In antiquity Geryon
was a monster with
three heads, six arms
and three bodies joined
together at the waist;
he was slain by
Hercules. In the middle
ages, however, Geryon
was equated with
fraud, with the face of
a just man but the body
of a reptile.
Geryon Conveying Dante and Virgil Down
Towards Malebolge
William Blake
Giant’s Well
• Geryon: Giant on
whose back Dante
descends to lower
hell; has a dragonlike form in
accordance with
Revelations 9: 9-20
• The Giant’s Well
leads to Circles 8
because Geryon
represents Fraud.
Geryon
Gustave Doré
Treachery:
Traitors Against Kin
(Family)
• Punishment –
Held in ICE with their
heads bent forward
The Circle of the Traitors: Dante's Foot Striking Bocca degli Abbati
William Blake
Treachery:
Against Country
• Punishment –
Gripped by ICE
while biting one
another’s head
Ugolino
Gustave Doré
• Souls Present –
Archbishop
Ruggieri, Ugolino
Treachery:
Against Guests & Hosts
• This means being a
traitor to a guest in
your home or to a
person hosting you
(like hospitality)
• Punishment – Held in
ICE with head up,
freezing their eyes
Traitors
Gustave Doré
Treachery:
Against Lords & Benefactors
• This means treachery
to masters (like Brutus
& Cassius)
• Punishment –
Completely immersed
in ICE, held by Lucifer
Traitors
Botticelli
Lucifer
Dante and Virgil are now in the
ninth and last circle, that of the
Traitors, and have reached the
inner of four concentric rings
where traitors are frozen in a
kind of building, shining like
straw in glass. At the centre
stands Lucifer, frozen from the
waist down, with three heads
and bat-like wings, the flapping
of which freezes the heart of
Hell. In each mouth he chews
on a sinner: Judas Iscariot,
Brutus and Cassius.
Lucifer
William Blake
Lucifer (art)
Lucifer, King of Hell,
by Gustave Doré
Lucifer (art)
Lucifer
Botticelli
Lucifer (art)
• Dante, in the lowest
circle of hell, witnesses a
gigantic Lucifer who
possesses three heads,
the wings of a bat, and is
covered with frozen,
matted hair. He weeps
from all six eyes a
grotesque mixture of
tears, blood, and pus.
artist unavailable
Lucifer
(art)
• “We must depart from
evil so extreme.”
Dante Alighieri
La Divina Commedia
Lucifer
Salvadore Dalí
Lucifer (art)
Salvadore Dali as Lucifer
by Jade Christian Green