That which before had pleased me then displeased me;

And penitent and confessing I surrendered,

Ah woe is me! and it would have bestead me;
The Leader of the modern Pharisees
Having a war near unto Lateran, 330
330 This Papal war, which was waged against Christians, and not against pagan Sara-
cens, nor unbelieving Jews, nor against the renegades who had helped them at the siege
of Acre, or given them aid and comfort by traffic, is thus described by Mr. Norton, Travel
and Study in Italy, p. 263: –
“This ‘war near the Lateran’ was a war with the great family of Colonna. Two of the
house were Cardinals. They had been deceived in the election, and were rebellious un-
der the rule of Boniface. The Cardinals of the great Ghibelline house took no pains to
conceal their ill-will toward the Guelf Pope. Boniface, indeed, accused them of plotting
with his enemies for his overthrow. The Colonnas, finding Rome unsafe, had withdrawn
to their strong town of Palestrina, whence they could issue forth at will for plunder, and
where they could give shelter to those who shared in their hostility toward the Pope. On
the other hand, Boniface, not trusting himself in Rome, withdrew to the secure height of
Orvieto, and thence, on the 14th of December, 1297, issued a terrible bull for a crusade
against them, granting plenary indulgence to all, (such was the Christian temper of the
times, and so literally were the violent seizing upon the kingdom of Heaven,) granting
plenary indulgence to all who would take up arms against these rebellious sons of the
Church and march against their chief stronghold, their ‘alto seggio’ of Palestrina. They
and their adherents had already been excommunicated and put under the ban of the
Church; they had been stripped of all dignities and privileges; their property had been
confiscated; and they were now by this bull placed in the position of enemies, not of the
Pope alone, but of the Church Universal. Troops gathered against them from all quar-
ters of Papal Italy. Their lands were ravaged, and they themselves shut up within their
stronghold; but for a long time they held out in their ancient high-walled mountaintown.
It was to gain Palestrina that Boniface ‘had war near the Lateran.’ The great church and
palace of the Lateran, standing on the summit of the Coelian Hill, close to the city wall,
overlooks the Campagna, which, in broken levels of brown and green and purple fields,
reaches to the base of the encircling mountains. Twenty miles away, crowning the top
and clinging to the side of one of the last heights of the Sabine range, are the gray walls
and roofs of Palestrina. It was a far more conspicuous place at the close of the thirteenth
century than it is now; for the great columns of the famous temple of Fortune still rose
above the town, and the ancient citadel kept watch over it from its high rock. At length,
in September, 1298, the Colonnas, reduced to the hardest extremities, became ready for
peace. Boniface promised largely. The two Cardinals presented themselves before him at
Rieti, in coarse brown dresses, and with ropes around their necks, in token of their repen-
tance and submission. The Pope gave them not only pardon and absolution, but hope of
being restored to their titles and possessions. This was the ‘lunga promessa con l’attender
corto’; for, while the Colonnas were retained near him, and these deceptive hopes held out
to them, Boniface sent the Bishop of Orvieto to take possession of Palestrina, and to de-
stroy it utterly, leaving only the church to stand as a monument above its ruins. The work
was done thoroughly; – a plough was drawn across the site of the unhappy town, and
salt scattered in the furrow, that the land might thenceforth be desolate. The inhabitants
were removed from the mountain to the plain, and there forced to build new homes forDante Alighieri -
Divine Comedy, Inferno 181
And not with Saracens nor with the Jews,
For each one of his enemies was Christian,
And none of them had been to conquer Acre,
Nor merchandising in the Sultan’s land,
Nor the high office, nor the sacred orders,
In him regarded, nor in me that cord
Which used to make those girt with it more meagre;
But even as Constantine sought out Sylvester
To cure his leprosy, within Soracte,
So this one sought me out as an adept 331
To cure him of the fever of his pride.
Counsel he asked of me, and I was silent,
Because his words appeared inebriate.
And then he said: ‘Be not thy heart afraid;
Henceforth I thee absolve; and thou instruct me
How to raze Palestrina to the ground.
Heaven have I power to lock and to unlock,
As thou dost know; therefore the keys are two,
The which my predecessor held not dear.’ 332
Then urged me on his weighty arguments
There, where my silence was the worst advice;
And said I: ‘Father, since thou washest me
Of that sin into which I now must fall,
The promise long with the fulfilment short
Will make thee triumph in thy lofty seat.’
Francis came afterward, when I was dead,
For me; but one of the black Cherubim
Said to him: ‘Take him not; do me no wrong;
He must come down among my servitors,
Because he gave the fraudulent advice
From which time forth I have been at his hair;
themselves, which, in their turn, two years afterwards, were thrown down and burned
by order of the implacable Pope. This last piece of malignity was accomplished in 1300,
the year of the Jubilee, the year in which Dante was in Rome and in which he saw Guy of
Montefeltro, the counsellor of Boniface in deceit, burning in Hell.”
331 Montefeltro was in the Franciscan monastery at Assisi.
332 Pope Celestine V., who made “the great refusal,” or abdication of the papacy. See
note in Canto III.182 http://www.paskvil.com/
For who repents not cannot be absolved,
Nor can one both repent and will at once,
Because of the contradiction which consents not.
O miserable me! how I did shudder
When he seized on me, saying: ‘Peradventure
Thou didst not think that I was a logician!’
He bore me unto Minos, who entwined
Eight times his tail about his stubborn back,
And after he had bitten it in great rage,
Said: ‘Of the thievish fire a culprit this;’
Wherefore, here where thou seest, am I lost,
And vested thus in going I bemoan me.”
When it had thus completed its recital,
The flame departed uttering lamentations,
Writhing and flapping its sharp-pointed horn.
Onward we passed, both I and my Conductor,
Up o’er the crag above another arch,
Which the moat covers, where is paid the fee
By those who, sowing discord, win their burden.Inferno
Canto 28
W HO ever could, e’en with untrammelled words, 333
Tell of the blood and of the wounds in full
Which now I saw, by many times narrating?
Each tongue would for a certainty fall short
By reason of our speech and memory,
That have small room to comprehend so much
If were again assembled all the people
Which formerly upon the fateful land
Of Puglia were lamenting for their blood 334
Shed by the Romans and the lingering war 335
That of the rings made such illustrious spoils, 336
As Livy has recorded, who errs not,
With those who felt the agony of blows
By making counterstand to Robert Guiscard, 337
And all the rest, whose bones are gathered still
At Ceperano, where a renegade 338
333 The Ninth Bolgia, in which are punished the Schismatics, and “where is paid the fee
by those who sowing discord win their burden”; a burden difficult to describe even with
untrammelled words, or in plain prose, free from the fetters of rhyme.
334 Apulia, or La Puglia, is in the southeastern part of Italy, “between the spur and the
heel of the boot.”
335 The people slain in the conquest of Apulia by the Romans.
336 Hannibal’s famous battle at Cannae, in the second Punic war. According to Livy,
XXII. 49, “The number of the slain is computed at forty thousand foot, and two thousand
seven hundred horse.”
337 Robert Guiscard, the renowned Norman conqueror of southern Italy. Dante places
him in the Fifth Heaven of Paradise, in the planet Mars.
338 The battle of Ceperano, near Monte Cassino, was fought in 1265, between Charles
of Anjou and Manfred, king of Apulia and Sicily. The Apulians, seeing the battle going
against them, deserted their king and passed over to the enemy.
183184 http://www.paskvil.com/
Was each Apulian, and at Tagliacozzo, 339
Where without arms the old Alardo conquered,
And one his limb transpierced, and one lopped off,
Should show, it would be nothing to compare
With the disgusting mode of the ninth Bolgia.
A cask by losing centre-piece or cant
Was never shattered so, as I saw one
Rent from the chin to where one breaketh wind.
Between his legs were hanging down his entrails;
His heart was visible, and the dismal sack
That maketh excrement of what is eaten.
While I was all absorbed in seeing him,
He looked at me, and opened with his hands
His bosom, saying: “See now how I rend me;
How mutilated, see, is Mahomet;
In front of me doth Ali weeping go,
Cleft in the face from forelock unto chin;
And all the others whom thou here beholdest,
Disseminators of scandal and of schism
While living were, and therefore are cleft thus.
A devil is behind here, who doth cleave us
Thus cruelly, unto the falchion’s edge
Putting again each one of all this ream,
When we have gone around the doleful road;
By reason that our wounds are closed again
Ere any one in front of him repass.
But who art thou, that musest on the crag,
Perchance to postpone going to the pain
That is adjudged upon thine accusations?”
339 The battle of Tagliacozzo in Abruzzo was fought in 1268, between Charles of Anjou
and Curradino or Conradin, nephew of Manfred. Charles gained the victory by the strat-
egy of Count Alardo di Valleri, who, “weaponless himself, made arms ridiculous.” This
valiant but wary crusader persuaded the king to keep a third of his forces in reserve; and
when the soldiers of Curradino, thinking they had won the day, were scattered over the
field in pursuit of plunder, Charles fell upon them, and routed them.
Alardo is mentioned in the Cento Novelle Antiche, Nov. LVII., as “celebrated for his won-
derful prowess even among the chief nobles, and no less esteemed for his singular virtues
than for his courage.”Dante Alighieri - Divine Comedy, Inferno 185
“Nor death hath reached him yet, nor guilt doth bring him,”
My Master made reply, “to be tormented;
But to procure him full experience,
Me, who am dead, behoves it to conduct him
Down here through Hell, from circle unto circle;
And this is true as that I speak to thee.”
More than a hundred were there when they heard him,
Who in the moat stood still to look at me,
Through wonderment oblivious of their torture.
“Now say to Fra Dolcino, then, to arm him, 340
Thou, who perhaps wilt shortly see the sun,
If soon he wish not here to follow me,
So with provisions, that no stress of snow
May give the victory to the Novarese, 341
Which otherwise to gain would not be easy.”
After one foot to go away he lifted,
This word did Mahomet say unto me,
Then to depart upon the ground he stretched it.
Another one, who had his throat pierced through,
And nose cut off close underneath the brows,
And had no longer but a single ear,
Staying to look in wonder with the others,
Before the others did his gullet open,
Which outwardly was red in every part,
And said: “O thou, whom guilt doth not condemn,
And whom I once saw up in Latian land,
Unless too great similitude deceive me,
Call to remembrance Pier da Medicina, 342
340 Fra Dolcino was one of the early social and religious reformers in the North of Italy.
His sect bore the name of “Apostles,” and its chief, if not only, heresy was a desire to
bring back the Church to the simplicity of the apostolic times. In 1305 he withdrew with
his followers to the mountains overlooking the Val Sesia in Piedmont, where he was
pursued and besieged by the Church party, and, after various fortunes of victory and
defeat, being reduced by “stress of snow” and famine, was taken prisoner, together with
his companion, the beautiful Margaret of Trent. Both were burned at Vercelli on the 1st
of June, 1307.
341 Val Sesia, among whose mountains Fra Dolcino was taken prisoner, is in the diocese
of Novara.
342 A Bolognese, who stirred up dissensions among the citizens.186 http://www.paskvil.com/
Figure 51: Staying to look in wonder with the others...
If e’er thou see again the lovely plain 343
That from Vercelli slopes to Marcabo,
And make it known to the best two of Fano, 344
To Messer Guido and Angiolello likewise,
That if foreseeing here be not in vain,
Cast over from their vessel shall they be,
And drowned near unto the Cattolica,
By the betrayal of a tyrant fell.
Between the isles of Cyprus and Majorca
Neptune ne’er yet beheld so great a crime
Neither of pirates nor Argolic people.
343 The plain of Lombardy sloping down two hundred miles and more, from Vercelli in
Piedmont to Marcabo, a village near Ravenna.
344 Guido del Cassero and Angiolello da Cagnano, two honorable citizens of Fano, go-
ing to Rimini by invitation of Malatestino, were by his order thrown into the sea and
drowned, as here prophesied or narrated, near the village of Cattolica on the Adriatic.Dante Alighieri -
Divine Comedy, Inferno 187
That traitor, who sees only with one eye, 345
And holds the land, which some one here with me 346
Would fain be fasting from the vision of,
Will make them come unto a parley with him;
Then will do so, that to Focara’s wind 347
They will not stand in need of vow or prayer.”
And I to him: “Show to me and declare,
If thou wouldst have me bear up news of thee,
Who is this person of the bitter vision.”
Then did he lay his hand upon the jaw
Of one of his companions, and his mouth
Oped, crying: “This is he, and he speaks not.
This one, being banished, every doubt submerged
In Caesar by affirming the forearmed
Always with detriment allowed delay.”
O how bewildered unto me appeared,
With tongue asunder in his windpipe slit,
Curio, who in speaking was so bold!
And one, who both his hands dissevered had,
The stumps uplifting through the murky air,
So that the blood made horrible his face, 348
Cried out: “Thou shalt remember Mosca also, 349
Who said, alas! ‘A thing done has an end!’
Which was an ill seed for the Tuscan people
“And death unto thy race,” thereto I added;
Whence he, accumulating woe on woe,
Departed, like a person sad and crazed.
But I remained to look upon the crowd;
And saw a thing which I should be afraid,
345 Malatestino had lost one eye.
346 Rimini.
347 Focara is a headland near Catolica, famous for dangerous winds, to be preserved
from which mariners offered up vows and prayers. These men will not need to do it;
they will not reach that cape.
348 Curio, the banished Tribune, who, fleeing to Caesar’s camp on the Rubicon, urged
him to advance upon Rome.
349 Mosca degl’Uberti, or dei Lamberti, who, by advising the murder of Buondelmonte,
gave rise to the parties of Guelf and Ghibelline, which so long divided Florence. See note
in Canto X.188 http://www.paskvil.com/
Without some further proof, even to recount,
If it were not that conscience reassures me,
That good companion which emboldens man
Beneath the hauberk of its feeling pure.
I truly saw, and still I seem to see it,
A trunk without a head walk in like manner
As walked the others of the mournful herd.
And by the hair it held the head dissevered,
Hung from the hand in fashion of a lantern,
And that upon us gazed and said: “O me!”
It of itself made to itself a lamp,
And they were two in one, and one in two;
How that can be, He knows who so ordains it.
When it was come close to the bridge’s foot,
It lifted high its arm with all the head,
To bring more closely unto us its words,
Which were: “Behold now the sore penalty,
Thou, who dost breathing go the dead beholding;
Behold if any be as great as this.
And so that thou may carry news of me,
Know that Bertram de Born am I, the same 350
Who gave to the Young King the evil comfort. 351
I made the father and the son rebellious;
350 Bertrand de Born, the turbulent Troubadour of the last half of the twelfth century,
was alike skilful with his pen and his sword, and passed his life in alternately singing
and fighting, and in stirring up dissension and strife among his neighbors.
351 A vast majority of manuscripts and printed editions read in this line, Re Giovanni,
King John, instead of Re Giovane, the Young King. Even Boccaccio’s copy, which he wrote
out with his own had for Petrarca, has Re Giovanni. Out of seventy-nine Codici examined
by Barlow, he says, Study of the Divina Commedia, p. 153, “Only five were found with
the correct reading – re giovane... The reading re giovane is not found in any of the early
editions, nor is it noticed by any of the early commentators.” See also Ginguen, Hist. Litt.
de l’Italie, II, 486, where the subject is elaborately discussed, and the note of Biagioli, who
takes the opposite side of the question.
Henry II. of England had four sons, all of whom were more or less rebellious against
him. They were, Henry, surnamed Curt-Mantle, and called by the Troubadours and nov-
elists of his time “The Young King,” because he was crowned during his father’s life;
Richard Coeur-de-Lion, Count of Guienne and Poitou; Geoffroy, Duke of Brittany; and
John Lackland. Henry was the only one of these who bore the title of king at the time in
question.Dante Alighieri - Divine Comedy, Inferno 189
Achitophel not more with Absalom
And David did with his accursed goadings.
Because I parted persons so united,
Parted do I now bear my brain, alas!
From its beginning, which is in this trunk.
Thus is observed in me the counterpoise.”190 http://www.paskvil.com/
Figure 52: How mutilated, see, is Mahomet...Dante Alighieri - Divine Comedy, Inferno 191
Figure 53: And by the hair it held the head dissevered...Inferno
Canto 29
T HE many people and the divers wounds 352
These eyes of mine had so inebriated,
That they were wishful to stand still and weep;
But said Virgilius: “What dost thou still gaze at?
Why is thy sight still riveted down there
Among the mournful, mutilated shades?
Thou hast not done so at the other Bolge;
Consider, if to count them thou believest,
That two-and-twenty miles the valley winds,
And now the moon is underneath our feet;
Henceforth the time allotted us is brief,
And more is to be seen than what thou seest.”
“If thou hadst,” I made answer thereupon
“Attended to the cause for which I looked,
Perhaps a longer stay thou wouldst have pardoned.”
Meanwhile my Guide departed, and behind him
I went, already making my reply,
And superadding: “In that cavern where
I held mine eyes with such attention fixed,
I think a spirit of my blood laments
The sin which down below there costs so much”
Then said the Master: “Be no longer broken
Thy thought from this time forward upon him;
Attend elsewhere, and there let him remain;
For him I saw below the little bridge,
Pointing at thee, and threatening with his finger
352 The Tenth and last “cloister of Malebolge,” where “Justice infallible punishes forg-
ers,” and falsifiers of all kinds. This Canto is devoted to the alchemists.
192Dante Alighieri - Divine Comedy, Inferno 193
Fiercely, and heard him called Geri del Bello. 353
So wholly at that time wast thou impeded
By him who formerly held Altaforte, 354
Thou didst not look that way; so he departed.”
“O my Conductor, his own violent death,
Which is not yet avenged for him,” I said,
“By any who is sharer in the shame,
Made him disdainful; whence he went away,
As I imagine, without speaking to me, 355
And thereby made me pity him the more.” 356
Thus did we speak as far as the first place
Upon the crag, which the next valley shows
Down to the bottom, if there were more light.
When we were now right over the last cloister
Of Malebolge, so that its lay-brothers
Could manifest themselves unto our sight,
Divers lamentings pierced me through and through,
Which with compassion had their arrows barbed,
Whereat mine ears I covered with my hands.
What pain would be, if from the hospitals 357
Of Valdichiana, ’twixt July and September,
And of Maremma and Sardinia
All the diseases in one moat were gathered,
353 Geri del Bello was a disreputable member of the Alighieri family, and was murdered
by one of the Sacchetti. His death was afterwards avenged by his brother, who in turn
slew one of the Sacchetti at the door of his house.
354 Bertrand de Born.
355 Like the ghost of Ajax in the Odyssey, XI. “He answered me not at all, but went to
Erebus amongst the other souls of the dead.”
356 Dante seems to share the feeling of the Italian vendetta, which required retaliation
from some member of the injured family. “Among the Italians of this age,” says Napier,
Florentine Hist., I. Ch. VII., “and for centuries after, private offence was never forgotten
until revenged, and generally involved a succession of mutual injuries; vengeance was
not only considered lawful and just, but a positive duty, dishonorable to omit; and, as
may be learned from ancient private journals, it was sometimes allowed to sleep for five-
and-thirty years, and then suddently struck a victim who perhaps had not yet seen the
light when the original injury was inflicted.”
357 The Val di Chiana, near Arezzo, was in Dante’s time marshy and pestilential. Now,
by the effect of drainage, it is one of the most beautiful and fruitful of the Tuscan valleys.
The Maremma was and is notoriously unhealthy; see note in Canto XIII., and Sardinia
would seem to have shared its ill repute.