15 (p. 109) “their brows are threatening woe to us?”: Dante the Pilgrim is far more suspicious of Malacoda and his colleagues than is his guide. Virgil may embody some of the aspects of reason and learning, but from his performance in various places in Hell, it is clear that he cannot represent Human Reason in any strict allegorical sense, since he is so often quite fallible.
16 (p. 109) each one thrust his tongue ... made a trumpet of his rump: The Italian is a bit more explicit, “rump” being Longfellow’s more polite word for what Dante really intended in the original—“ass” or “asshole.” Malacoda farts toward his troops as a signal, and they seem prepared to respond with a counter signal, a “Bronx cheer” or a “raspberry.” The depiction of the devils in this section of Hell contains, as shall be evident from the next canto as well, some of the more comic action in the entire poem.
CANTO XXII
1 (p. 110) O Aretines: Most commentators believe this remark about the Aretines (residents of the city of Arezzo) refers to the battle of Campaldino (1289), where forces from Arezzo were defeated by Florentines and troops from Lucca. Dante fought at this battle.
2 (p. 112) “I in the kingdom of Navarre was born ... pay the reckoning in this heat”: The identity of this barrater is not known. We learn from Dante that he served King Thibault II of Navarre, who ruled this kingdom in northern Spain from 1253 to 1270. Most commentators have identified him as a certain Ciampolo, or Giampolo. Almost any courtier would serve Dante’s purpose here.
3 (p. 112) “Latian ... was a neighbor to it”: In the original, Dante uses the word latino, which can mean “Latin” but also “Italian,” referring particularly to Italians who come from what was ancient Latium (modern Lazio), the region around Rome. When Ciampolo says he knows of a sinner “who was a neighbor,” he means someone from Italy. He will identify that individual in 1. 82 as Friar Gomita (see note 5).
4 (p. 112) their Decurion: This is a reference to Barbariccia, who, in canto XXI: 120, Dante describes as the leader of the ten devils (he calls them there a decina, from the Latin military term decuria, meaning a squad of ten soldiers). He is therefore in rank a decurion, just as a centurion was in charge of 100 Roman soldiers.
5 (P. 113) Friar Gomita: Around 1294, this friar was appointed deputy to the Pisan chancellor of Gallura, one of the four administrative districts into which the island of Sardinia was divided. He was hanged for his outrageous acceptance of bribes to allow prisoners to escape.
6 (p. 113) Don Michael Zanche: He served as governor of another administrative district in Sardinia, Logodoro, during the thirteenth century. When King Enzo of Sardinia, the son of Frederick II, was captured, Don Michael married his wife, Adelasia, and ruled Sardinia until around 1290, when his son-in-law, Branca d‘Oria of Genoa, murdered him. Branca will appear in canto XXXII: 137-147, in the lowest region of Hell. Don Michael apparently surpassed even Friar Gomita in barratry.
7 (P. 113) the grand Provost: The grand provost, or marshal, is Barbariccia (see note 4).
8 (p. 114) thou shalt hear new sport!: The events in this passage seem like an infernal game. In fact, Dante the Poet refers to what he witnesses as the “new sport,” and we must remember that these antics will be repeated for all eternity. The speaker is the sinner who scholars have identified as Ciampolo. During this conversation with the two poets and the Malebranche devils, he proves that he is cleverer than his torturers. Basically, he tricks the devils into allowing him to escape their claws, thereby deceiving his captors with the cleverness that is involved in the sins connected with fraud. Earlier Dante the Pilgrim seemed to understand the devils better than did his guide Virgil. Here Cagnazzo understands that Ciampolo is lying to the devils, while Alichino does not.
CANTO XXIII
1 (p. 116) As go the Minor Friars along their way: Franciscans (known as Friars Minor) usually walked in single file, led by the most highly ranked member of the group.
2 (p. 116) the fable of Æsop... of the frog and mouse: This fable (probably not by Aesop) recounts that a mouse asks a frog to carry him across a stream, and the frog agrees and ties the mouse to his leg, but once in the water he dives to drown the mouse. Meanwhile, a hawk swoops down on them both and carries them away, killing the frog. The mouse tied to the frog is either killed along with the frog (according to a version of the fable included in a collection attributed to Romulus, a writer of the Carolingian period) or is freed by accident while the frog dies (according to a twelfth-century version told by Marie de France). Dante compares this fable (and it is unclear which ending he intends) to the events we have witnessed in canto XXII, where Ciampolo tricks the devils. Ciampolo would be the mouse, Alichino the frog, and Calcabrina the rapacious bird. It may also refer to the situation in which the two poets find themselves: In this case, Dante would be the mouse, Virgil the frog, and the Malebranche devils the hawk. Whatever meaning Dante intended to assign to this story, he has certainly presented a puzzle that will continue to bemuse his critics.
3 (p. 116) For mo and issa are not more alike: Both words are dialect terms meaning “now” and are derived respectively from the Latin modo and ipsa hora. Dante the Poet continues to pique our curiosity by saying, in effect, that the story from the fable and the action we have just witnessed are as alike as the two words. But again the puzzle continues, since their meanings (like the content of the stories) are the same, while their spellings and Latin origins are different.
4 (p. 116) of leaded glass: Dante means a mirror, as mirrors were made with clear glass backed by lead.
5 (p. 117) any land-built mill: Dante distinguishes this mill, the kind operated by running water diverted from its source by a sluice, from water mills that actually floated on a raft in a stream or river.
6 (p. 117) As his own son: Dante underlines the close affection Virgil has begun to feel for his pupil, who is no longer just a guest in Hell but is like a son to him. Earlier in the canto (1. 40), Dante compares Virgil’s act of grabbing the Pilgrim to his breast to escape the attacking devils to the maternal action of a woman seeking to save a child from a house fire.
7 (p. 117) The power of thence departing took from all: We learn another of Hell’s rules—the beings assigned to torture the souls in each section of Hell are not permitted by God to leave the region to which they have been assigned. Virgil has now brought the Pilgrim to the sixth Bolgia, the region of the hypocrites.
8 (pp. 117—118) They had on mantles ... of straw: Hypocrites dress as monks (so proverbial was the hypocrisy of the clergy in Dante’s time and afterward). Longfellow has followed a textual reading here that has been rejected by contemporary Dante scholars, for he translates the city as Cologne, in Germany, while the texts accepted today use Cluny, the town in France where the famous Benedictine abbey was located. This seems to make more sense in the context of the passage. The mantles are gilded, recalling the biblical story in Matthew 23:27, in which hypocritical scribes and Pharisees are described as being, on the outside, like beautiful sepulchers that contain bones and corruption within. Dante’s mantles are made of lead and are so heavy that the ones employed by Frederick II (the ruler already mentioned in canto X: 119) weigh no more than straw in comparison. According to medieval tradition, Frederick executed traitors by wrapping them in capes of lead, using fire to melt the metal and killing the traitors in a slow, horribly painful manner.
9 (p. 118) we were new in company at each motion of the haunch: The hypocrites move so slowly with the weight of their mantles that each time the two poets take a step (that is, move their hips, or haunches), they pass on to another slow-moving sinner.
10 (p. 118) the Tuscan speech: Once again, Dante’s Tuscan dialect (today standard Italian) causes the denizens of Hell to recognize him immediately. Needless to say, Dante did not mean this to be a complement to his fellow citizens, since so many of them populate the Inferno.
11 (p. 119) their balances to creak: The friars resemble creaking balances, or scales, because the weight they support is so great.
Dante refers, of course, to the medieval balance—in which two pans hang from each end of a bar balanced on a central support, a shape that resembles the hypocrites wearing their mantles.
12 (p. 119) “Frati Gaudenti were we ... round Gardingo”: The Frati Gaudenti (Jovial Friars) was a military and conventual order that was officially called the Knights of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Formed in Bologna in 1261, the order was dedicated, under the patronage of Pope Urban IV, to peacemaking between the warring factions in Italian cities. Obviously, given their informal name, the Jovial Friars were not too interested in the aesthetic life. Catalano Catalani (1210—1285), a Bolognese Guelph, and Loderingo degli Andalò, a Bolognese Ghibelline, were elected in 1266 to serve jointly in Florence as podestà (something like a mayor, an office held by noncitizens to maintain impartiality among the warring factions of the city). In fact, their support of the Guelph party resulted in the expulsion, with the assistance of Pope Clement IV, of the Ghibellines from Florence in 1266 and the destruction of many of the most famous Ghibelline residences in the city, including that of Farinata, the Florentine Dante encountered in canto X. This area near the Palazzo Vecchio was then called the Gardingo.
13 (p. 119) “O Friars,” began I, “your iniquitous ... ”: The Pilgrim is probably about to lower the boom on the two hypocrites who caused so much damage to his native city, but he is interrupted by a more startling sight—that of crucified men upon whom people are walking.
14 (pp. 119—120) “This tranifixed one ... for the Jews was a malignant seed”: Catalano’s explanation enables us to identify the “transfixed one” as Caiaphas, leader of the Pharisees who condemned Jesus to death (as told in the Bible, John 11: 49-52). Here too is his father-in-law, Annas, who delivered Jesus to Caiaphas for judgment (John 18: 13). Since Dante believed the Jews shed the innocent blood of Christ, that “malignant seed” bore bitter fruit when the Romans, led by Titus, son of the Emperor Vespasian, destroyed the Temple and brought about the Diaspora of the Hebrews in A.D. 70. Obviously Dante had not yet been enlightened by the pronouncement of Pope John Paul II that the Roman Catholic Church no longer holds the Jews responsible for the death of Jesus!
15 (p. 120) I saw Virgilius marvel o’er him who was extended on the cross: This is the first time that Virgil marvels at a punishment in Hell. He has seen not Caiaphas on the cross before, because his previous visit to Hell was before Christ’s Crucifixion. As a Roman, he would not likely marvel at the type of punishment, since crucifixion was the Roman punishment par excellence. It is more likely that Virgil cannot understand why anyone who knew Christ could have done such a thing, since his experience after Christ’s death has obviously revealed to the Roman poet how the powers of the Christian God control the universe and the afterlife.
16 (p. 120) the black angels: These are the winged devils from the last bolgia.
17 (p. 120) “badly he recounted”: Virgil is now told that Malacoda lied to him about the crossings on the road ahead—the bridge Malacoda said was still in operation cannot be used.
18 (p. 120) by anger in his looks ... after the prints of his beloved feet: Virgil is angry that Malacoda has tricked him and also because, in 1. 44, Catalano has cited the Bible to him—a passage from John 8: 44, which states that the Devil is a liar and the father of lies. Virgil is well aware that the devil is a liar and is annoyed to be told so by the shade of a sinner, and he rushes angrily off the scene. In spite of Virgil’s human failings, the Pilgrim respects his “beloved guide.”
CANTO XXIV
1 (p. 121) beneath Aquarius tempers . . . at the mountain’s foot I first beheld: We are now in the seventh Bolgia, where thieves are punished. The simile that opens the canto places the stars in the zodiacal sign of Aquarius, between January 21 and February 21. In the first part of the simile, a peasant erroneously believes hoarfrost to be snow and is unhappy, but when he sees that the frost is gone, “the world has changed its countenance,” he realizes that he can indeed drive his sheep to pasture. Like the peasant, Dante is relieved when he sees that Virgil is returning to his former self-confidence and realizes that things will be as they once were when Virgil met the Pilgrim at the foot of the mountain in canto I.
2 (p. 121) at the ruin: This is more evidence of the earthquake that followed the Crucifixion of Christ.
3 (p. 122) no path for one clothed with a cloak ... he light, and I pushed upward: Dante is saying that a hypocrite wearing one of the mantles of lead described in canto XXIII could not have made this climb. Virgil has no body mass and therefore is immune to the force of gravity (“he light”), but as a human being affected by gravity’s pull, the Pilrgim is hard pressed to make the ascent.
4 (p. 122) one bank rises and the other sinks: Because Malebolge slopes toward a pit in the center (Cocytus), each bolgia is like a step on a conical, or funnel-shaped, staircase, with a steep bank on one side and a drop-off on the other.
5 (p. 122) As smoke in air or in the water foam: Virgil’s remarks echoes the view of the damned in Hell that only earthly fame will keep their memory alive. This is a comment that no true Christian should make.
6 (p. 124) a terrible throng of serpents ... and with Amphisbæna: Dante took the list of the frightening serpents he sees torturing the thieves in the seventh Bolgia from Lucan’s Pharsalia, Book IX. The Chelydri leave smoke in their wake; the Jaculi fly; the Phareae make tracks with their tails; the Cenchri wiggle from side to side; and the Amphisbaena have a head at each end. The appropriateness of the punishments here is clear. Thievery is a sneaky, reptilian operation. Since the thieves used their hands to steal, their hands are now bound; since thieves took property away, they are now made to disappear, only to reform again to repeat the entire process eternally.
7 (p. 124) Without the hope of hole or heliotrope: Heliotrope is a mythical stone reputed to have the power to make its owner invisible, as in Boccaccio’s comic story about Calandrino in the Decameron, Day VIII, Story 3. The sinners have no place to hide or no power to make them disappear.
8 (p. 124) upon their reins: Longfellow uses a literal translation of the Italian le rene (kidneys), but the word here refers to the lower back. Therefore the serpents are between the legs of the sinners.
9 (p. 124) Nor O so quickly e‘er, nor I was written: Both these letters of the alphabet can be written quite quickly with a single stroke.
10 (p. 124) The phœnix dies ... its five-hundredth year: According to Ovid, Metamorphoses, Book XV, this rare Arabian bird burned itself on a funeral pyre containing perfumes and was reborn from the ashes every five hundred years. Dante compares the thief he is about to meet to the bird’s eternal burning and rebirth.
11 (p. 124) by force of demons ... or other oppilation: An oppilation, an obstruction in a vein from the heart to the brain, may trigger the mysterious fainting spells Dante describes, but such fits may also be caused by the devils.
12 (p. 125) “a short time since I came into this cruel gorge ... I’m Vanni Fucci”: A Tuscan from the city of Pistoia, Fucci was the illegitimate son of Fuccio de’ Lazzari, the leader of the Black faction in that city. Vanni died some time around 1300 and is thus a fresh arrival. Dante is surprised to see him here, since he knew him as a violent, angry man who might have been expected to turn up in the River Phlegethon in the seventh circle.
13 (p. 125) I robbed the sacristy of the fair ornaments ... ’twas laid upon another: Unlike the devils or monsters that punish them, tortured souls are obliged to confess when asked about their sins (another rule of Hell). They do, however, try to dissemble or place a positive interpretation on what they say. In 1293 Vanni Fucci robbed the treasury of San Jacopo in the cathedral of San Zeno in Pistoia with several accomplices. Another man was almost executed for the crime before the truth emerged; Fucci was exiled from Pistoia and one of his confederates hanged.
14 (p. 125) “Thine ears to my announcement ope.... And this I’ve said that it may give thee pain”: To take revenge on the Pilgrim for forcing him to confess his crime, Vanni Fucci provid
es an unpleasant prophecy about the future: The Whites of Pistoia will banish the Neri (the Blacks) from the city, and they will go to Florence. In 1301 Pistoian Blacks went to Florence and joined the Florentine Black faction to take control of the city, exiling the Whites with the support of Charles of Valois. As a result of these events, Dante was banished from his native city. So even though Vanni Fucci has been condemned to Hell for theft, he nevertheless knows the future and understands that Dante will soon be exiled from Florence, never to return home. Vanni also prophesizes other political events that would be of interest to the Pilgrim. The “vapor” drawn by Mars from the Val di Magra refers to Moroello Malaspina, a Black Guelph leader from that area who soldiered for Florence against the Ghibellines; “Campo Picen” is near a White Guelph fortress that the Black Guelphs of Pistoia captured in 1302.
CANTO XXV
1 (p. 126) with both the figs ... he could not a motion make: Vanni Fucci’s gesture consists of inserting a thumb between the index and the middle finger of the hand and closing the fist, thus combining an image of the female vulva with a male phallus. (The gesture could be translated into the English vernacular as “Fuck you!” or “Up your ass!”) Since he points the gesture toward God (and, in fact, says, “Take that, God”), Fucci succeeds in being both obscene and blasphemous and is attacked by the snakes for his impertinence.
2 (p. 126) Pistoia, ah, Pistoia!: Pistoia was supposedly founded after 62. B.C. by the defeated soldiers in Catiline’s army, a group of Roman rebels for whom Dante had little use (see canto XV: 61-78).
3 (p. 126) Spirit I saw not against God so proud ... at Thebes down from the walls!: Fucci’s blasphemy surpasses even that of Capaneus, who blasphemed Jove while warring against Thebes and who we have already encountered among the blasphemers in the seventh circle (canto XIV: 63).
The Inferno (Barnes & Noble Classics Series) Page 25