Dante’s Inferno – Circles Six Through Nine

“Dante’s Inferno” authored by Dante Alighieri is a 14th-century narrative poem describing the journey of a fictionalized version of Dante himself through Hell, guided by the ancient Roman poet Virgil. It is widely considered the pre-eminent work in Italian literature and one of the greatest works of Western literature. In the poem, Hell is depicted as nine concentric circles of torment located within the Earth.

The Sixth Circle of Hell, as imagined by Dante, contain Heretics in a vast plain resembling a cemetery, trapped in flaming tombs. The temperature of the tomb depends upon the severity of the heresy.

The Seventh Circle of Hell is divided into three rings of the Violent; Violence Against Neighbors – the murderers, war-makers, plunderers, and tyrants who are immersed in a river of boiling blood and fire, Violence Against Self – the people that commit suicide who are transformed into gnarled, thorny trees and then fed upon by hideous clawed birds, and Violence Against God, Art and Nature – the blasphemers, sodomites, and usurers – all unnatural acts these souls suffer the great Plain of Burning Sand scorched by great flakes of flame falling slowly down from the sky, an image derived from the fate of Sodom and Gomorra. 

The Eighth Circle of Hell is a large funnel of stone shaped like an amphitheater around which run a series of ten deep, narrow, concentric ditches called bolge. These bolge contain those guilty of Simple Fraud. These include Panderers and Seducers who are whipped and driven by horned demons, Flatterers who are steeped in excrement representative of their false flatteries, Simonites (those selling ecclesiastical favors and offices) placed head-downwards in round holes with flames burning the soles of their feet, Sorcerers with heads twisted around on their bodies to look backwards, Corrupt Politicians immersed in a lake of boiling pitch and tore to pieces by demons, Hypocrites listlessly walking around a narrow track for eternity weighted down by leaden robes brilliantly gilded on the outside, Thieves pursued and bitten by snakes and lizards who curl themselves about the sinners and bind their hands behind their backs, Counsellors of Fraud who move about hidden from view inside individual flames, Sowers of Discord, hacked and mutilated by a large demon wielding a bloody sword, and Falsifiers who are afflicted with different types of afflictions such as horrible diseases, stench, thirst, filth, darkness, and screaming.

In the Ninth circle of Hell, souls guilty of Treachery against those with whom they had a special relationship are punished by being trapped in ice, each according to his guilt. The lake of ice is divided into four concentric rings of traitors corresponding, in order of seriousness, to betrayal of family ties, betrayal of community ties, betrayal of guests, and betrayal of lords. As they denied God’s love so they are furthest removed from the light and warmth of His Sun.

In the very centre of Hell, condemned for committing the ultimate sin (personal treachery against God), is the Devil himself shown weeping. He is a giant, terrifying beast trapped waist-deep in the ice, fixed and suffering. He has three faces, each with a different person inside the mouth, whom Dante considered one of the arch traitors of history – Judas, Brutus and Cassius.

These articles on Dante’s imagination of Hell are very much just a broad overview of the Circles of Hell. The book is filled with so much additional information related to the Circles including souls met both famous and not and explanations for how the various punishments relate to the sins. I hope some are encouraged to read this ancient masterpiece for themselves.