Euclide geometra e Tolommeo, 145 Che molte volte al fatto il dir vien meno. La sesta compagnia in due si scema ; Per altra via mi mena il savio duca, a./ 150 142. Ptolemy, the great geographer and astronomer of Alexandria, who lived in the second century B. C. 143. Hippocrates, Avicenna, Galen: three famous physicians of Greece, Turkestan, and Mysia. 144. Averrhoës, a Spanish Moor of the 12th century, was a celebrated scholar and philosopher. Having read the works of Aristotle in ancient Syriac translations, he composed three commentaries on them; one of these, the 'gran commento,' was followed by St. Thomas. As he inclined towards pantheism and materialism, he was regarded in the 14th century as the master of free-thinkers. -Feo fece. = 148. The company of six dwindles to two - Virgil and Dante. 150. Out of the peaceful atmosphere of the Palace into the air that quivers with sighs: cf. 11. 26-7. 151. Ove non è che luca, where there is nothing shining': beyond the brightness of the Palace. CANTO V ARGUMENT IN this canto are found several striking similes drawn from birdlife, which Dante loved to depict. The second circle, with its windwafted spirits, offers fit opportunity for these portrayals of starlings, cranes, and doves. Cranes are put to a like use by Virgil in Æn., X, 264-6: 'Quales sub nubibus atris Strymonia dant signa grues, atque æthera tranant Torraca quotes from the Tesoro of Brunetto Latini as follows: 'Gru sono uccelli che volano a squadre, a modo di cavalieri che vanno in battaglia.' The eager flight of the dove to her young was noted later by Rabelais (Pantagruel, IV, iii): 'Il n'est que vol de pigeon, quand il a œufz ou petitz, pour l'obstinée sollicitude en lui par nature posée de recourir et secourir ses pigeonneaux.' The descent from Limbus to the second circle is not described; we have no means of conjecturing the size or the steepness of the cliff. The journey through Hell being physically impossible, Dante purposely refrains from furnishing particulars that might destroy the illusion, while abounding in such details as serve to heighten it. As the pit narrows progressively toward the bottom, the terraces correspondingly decrease in circumference, but the penalties become more and more severe. At one point in the round of this shelf is a break, where the rock has fallen. When Dante mentions this ruina, in l. 34, he offers no explanation: shrieks and curses are redoubled here, but we know not why. Our suspense lasts until we reach Canto XII, II. 31-45. There we are told that when Christ descended into Hell, his coming was preceded by an earthquake, which shook down the walls of the abyss in three spots. Those broken places lie beside the circle of the pagans, just beyond the enclosure of the heretics, and over the hypocrites by whom Christ had been condemned (XXI, 112-4; XXIII, 133–8) · all close to the abodes of those who had offended the Saviour by disbelief in his mission. In each case the word 'ruin' is used. The sight of the first ruina moves the souls of the second circle to lamentation, because it reminds them of the time when the neighboring Hebrew spirits in the Limbus were rescued, while all the other souls in Hell were left to eternal torment. Most of the fallen angels, or fiends, are in the lower Hell; a few, however, appear as presiding genii outside the City of Dis: so Charon, Cerberus, Plutus, Phlegyas, and, at the threshold of the second circle, Minos, the judge. Both theologians and simple folk were prone to look upon the heathen gods as demons who had beguiled men into their worship. It is not strange, therefore, to find in a Christian Hell many classic personages, especially such as were already associated with the lower world. Dante did not treat all the pagan divinities alike; if he depicted Plutus as a devil, the Muses and Apollo were to him simply allegorical figures, while Jove apparently represented the ancient poets' dim conception of the Supreme Being. Minos, the great king and legislator of Crete, holds in the 11th book of the Odyssey the noble office of judge of the dead. In the Eneid, VI, 432-3, though briefly sketched, he retains the same honorable function: 'Quæsitor Minos urnam movet: ille silentum In Dante he has become a hideous demon, arbiter of the damned the symbol, it would seem, of the guilty conscience. The second circle punishes lussuria, or lust, the first of the sins of Incontinence. The luxurious are forever blown about in the T darkness by stormy blasts, typifying the blind fury of passion. In some previous tales of Hell a wind torments evildoers, notably in the Visio Alberici, XIV, where souls are driven by the fiery breath of a dog and a lion. Dante divests the torment of all grotesqueness, and, indeed, treats the sinners of this class with special consideration. This may be due in part to sympathy, and partly, no doubt, to a sense that their fault is the result of a mistaken following of love, the noblest of human emotions. Theologically speaking, the fate of lost souls should arouse no pity, as the sight of sin should excite only repugnance. But we must remember that the Dante who is visiting Hell is himself still a sinner. Moreover, allegorically interpreted, these harassed souls are men and women loving and suffering on earth; and even the most sinful, as long as they live, are fit objects of compassion. Compassion, tenderness, sympathetic curiosity, anguish, reach their climax when Dante meets and converses with Francesca da Rimini. This unhappy lady was the daughter of Guido Minore da Polenta, a powerful citizen of Ravenna, and was married to Giovanni di Malatesta da Verrucchio (called Sciancato, or Gian Ciotto), lord of Rimini. Of her love for Paolo, her husband's brother, and the murder of the two by Giovanni, we have no record before Dante, although the event must have been well known. It probably occurred about 1285: in 1282-3 Paolo was in Florence as Capitano del Popolo, and in 1288 there is evidence of a child born to Giovanni by a second wife. After Francesca's adventure had been made eternally famous by Dante's poem, many fables grew up about it; her fate is still a favorite theme for artists and authors. Of all the episodes in the Commedia, this has always been the most popular. It is not alone the undying passion of Francesca that moves us, but even mire her gentleness and modest reticence. In her narrative she ames none of the participants; not even her city is called by name. Her identity is revealed by Dante, who, recognizing her, addresses her as 'Francesca.' Everything in her story that could mar our pity is set aside, and nothing remains but the quintessence of love. Amid the tortures of Hell, where all is hatred, her love does not forsake her, and she glories in the thought that she and Paolo shall never be parted. Should we be inclined to question whether mere impersonal sympathy, however natural and profound, could have sufficed to lead a religious poet, a stern moralist, thus to idealize an adulteress and mitigate her punishment, we might feel ourselves justified in seeking some special reason for his kindliness. As we look through the Commedia, we find that in one place or another the exiled poet contrived to pay an appropriate tribute to all those who had befriended him in his need: it was the only return his grateful heart could make. His last and probably his happiest years were spent in Ravenna under the protection of Guido Novello da Polenta, a nephew of our Francesca. Now, we do not know exactly when Dante went to that city, but in any case it was almost certainly at a period later than the time when the Inferno was composed. His son Pietro, however, established himself in Ravenna, perhaps as early as 1317, receiving a benefice from Guido's wife; and his daughter Beatrice entered a convent there. It is possible that previous courtesies, of which we have no record, were extended to Dante or his kindred before this cantica was completed. There is, then, some slight ground for the supposition that this passage was intended as an incidental homage to Guido's family, a rehabilitation of Francesca's memory. Love, she says, comes to gentle hearts with irresistible force - 'a nullo amato amar perdona.' Had she lived, she would have repented; it was her sudden taking off that damned her. Her fate is contrasted with that of her husband: her soul is one of the highest in Hell; his, one of the lowest. See A. Graf, La demonologia di Dante in his Miti, leggende e superstizioni del medio evo, 1892-3, II, 79. For Francesca, F. De Sanctis, Francesca da Rimini in his Nuovi saggi critici, 1893 (6th ed.). For Dante's pity, D'Ovidio, 80-92; Moore, II, 210 ff.; F. Cipolla in the Atti del Reale Istituto Veneto, LIV, 294. Così discesi del cerchio primaio 1 Giù nel secondo, che men loco cinghia 5 ΤΟ 15 20 4. Minds: in medieval schools Greek proper names, in the nominative, were very commonly stressed on the last syllable, this having been apparently regarded as the regular Greek accentuation; hence Cleopatràs, Paris, Semiramis, and elsewhere Calliopè, Semelè, etc. For some reason Cleopatràs, with an s, seems to have been considered the correct form. 6. Avvinghia, ‘entwines.' 7. Dico, I mean.' 8. Li and gli were used interchangeably. 9. Peccata collective feminine plural (originally neuter plural) forms in -a were much commoner in Dante's day than now. = 19. Fide fidi. So, in l. 21, gride = gridi. The forms in -e are the older. 20. Cf. Mat. vii, 13: 'wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to destruction.' Also En., VI, 126-7: 'facilis descensus Averni: Noctes atque dies patet atri janua Ditis.' 21. Pur seems to mean tu pure, i. e., as well as Charon. |