The structure of Dante’s HellHistory 100, April 19, 2006
Reminder: paper due next Monday.Prof. Ogilvie’s cell phone: (413) 687-0780
The medieval cosmos
The medieval cosmos
Sublunary Superlunary
Four elements (earth, air, fire, water) Quintessence
Generation and corruption Unchanging
Imperfect motion (straight) Perfect motion (circular)
Space is moralized. Up is good, down is bad; movement up and down has a moral implication
Dante’s journey from Hell to Heaven
• The “dark wood” of sin
• Pilgrimage in the hereafter
• Dante: the pilgrim and the poet
The moral geography
of Hell
• The hierarchy of sin
• Crime and punishment
Punishment of soothsayers (Canto 20)
Pen and ink drawing by Franz Stassen, 1906
Fortune’s lesson
Wheel of fortune. Woodcut, probably by Albrecht Dürer, from
Sebastian Brant’s Narrenschiff, 1494
Dante and the pagan heritage
• Virgil, Dante’s poetic guide
• The virtuous pagans in Limbo
• The anomalous pagans in Purgatory and Paradise
Dante’s epic and medieval culture
• Criticism of his age
• The Church
• Dante’s political enemies (e.g. Farinata, Canto 10)
• Accepted yet immoral behavior
• The moral clarity of Hell
• Canto 14, lines 13-15