The Divine Comedy

by Dante Alighieri

  105. either by name or place: I.e., “Let me know who you are or from what city you came.”

  109. Sapìa was I, though sapient I was not: The pun is based, of course, upon the fact that the name “Sapìa” is derived from Latin sapiens.

  114. the descending arc of my own years: The figure seems to envision life as a semicircle. Since Dante has already made clear (Inferno, I, 1) that thirty-five is the mid-point, the arc would rise on one side of thirty-five and descend on the other. Since Sapìa was actually about sixty at the time she refers to, the figure may be taken to mean simply “my declining years.”

  117. prayed God to do what He already willed: Sapìa’s prayer that the Sienese be defeated was granted, and at the time she took the defeat as the answer to her prayer. Now, however, she sees that her prayer was answered by accident: she had simply happened to pray for what God had already willed should happen.

  123. like a blackbird: The occasional warm, sunny days that occur in Italy in January and February are called in Tuscany and Lombardy “the days of the blackbird.” The European blackbird is reputed by Italians to dread cold. When the winter sun shines brightly, however, it immediately perks up and acts as if it owned the world. But as soon as the cold returns, it huddles shivering and miserable.

  126. Penance would not yet have reduced my debt: As one of the Negligent who put off repentance till her final hour, Sapìa would still be waiting below but for the prayers of Pier Pettinaio. Her presently accomplished penance, therefore, would not yet have begun to reduce her debt of pain.

  127. Pier Pettinaio (Peh-tin-EYE-oh): Literally, Peter Combseller. He came to Siena as a boy from the country, became a Sienese citizen, and grew into a local legend of piety, later being honored by an annual feast day such as is normally reserved for saints. He operated a small shop in which he sold combs, hence his name. The legend of his piety is general among Sienese writers, but the incidents they cite from his life seem at least as daft as they are saintly. He was, however, much given to public prayer and to elaborate ideas of honesty, and as Dante might say, either tendency would be more than enough to distinguish him from the rest of the Sienese.

  131-132. and have your eyes unsewn: Sapìa could certainly tell from Dante’s words that he was not one of the Envious, but his very freedom in walking around would have been enough to tell her he was not blind. and breathe yet when you speak: The blind are well known for the sharpness of their hearing; even a slight aspiration on Dante’s part would reveal him to Sapìa. How the spirits managed to talk without breathing is a matter Dante would, of course, refer to God’s Will.

  Throughout this Cornice, Dante’s description of the behavior of the blind is marvelously acute: the way they turn their heads, the way they talk (in the next Canto) about a man who is standing in front of them as if he were not there, the way they put their heads together to speak to one another—all bear evidence to Dante’s powers of observation.

  142-143. if you would have me move: If you would like me to bestir myself to solicit prayers for you when I return to Earth.

  150. restore my name: In her final years Sapìa performed a number of good works for Siena, but there are several reports that she was generally contemned as a traitor.

  151-155. A complicated passage of local reference certainly put into Sapìa’s mouth by Dante as a Florentine jibe at the Sienese (“that foolish mob”). Dante (who fears the Ledge of Pride just below him) may have to carry his stone a bit further for his addiction to such touches, but his poem is certainly the livelier for them.

  Talamone is a point on Italy’s west coast about eighty miles almost due south of Siena. The Sienese, lacking a port, and wanting to compete with Genoa, bought the site in 1303 and invested heavily in building and dredging operations. The scheme, not nearly as unreasonable as Dante would have it seem, failed because of malarial conditions and because the hoped-for port silted in almost as fast as it could be dredged.

  The Diana was another project intermittently undertaken by the Sienese over a long period. Siena was water-poor, but the magnificent flow at certain wells suggested to the Sienese the presence of an underground river which they christened the Diana, and which they dug for at great expense. All efforts had failed up to Dante’s time and the failures were used as a standing joke against the Sienese as overambitious crackpots trying to make themselves better than they were. The Sienese, however (and largely out of hard necessity), continued their expensive digging and did, sometime later, locate a substantial underground flow. There is still a Well of Diana in a convent in Siena.

  A third difficulty in this passage is in the meaning of “admirals.” Some of the old commentators report “admiral” was the term for what we should call “contractor” or “engineer in charge of construction.” (Cf. British-English “navvy,” derived from “navigator.”) Or it may be that Dante meant that “port-admirals” (i.e., “port-masters” or “harbor-masters”) supervised the work. If these are proper interpretations, then the

  “admirals” would “lose the most” because they would die of malaria. If, however, Dante means “admirals” as “ships’ captains,” they would lose the most if they tried to use the port, or if they waited until the Sienese finished it. Dante may, of course, have intended all three possibilities at once.

  Canto XIV

  THE SECOND CORNICE

  The Envious

  The Rein of Envy

  Dante’s conversation with Sapìa of Siena is overheard by two spirits who sit side by side against the inner cliff-face. They are GUIDO DEL DUCA and RINIERI DA CALBOLI.

  Dante enters into conversation with them, and Guido denounces the inhabitants of the cities of the Valley of the Arno. He then prophesies the slaughter that Rinieri’s grandson, FULCIERI, shall visit upon Florence. And he prophesies also that Fulcieri’s actions will have a bearing on Dante’s approaching exile from Florence. Guido concludes with a lament for the past glories of Romagna as compared to its present degeneracy.

  Leaving the two spirits in tears, Dante and Virgil move on, and they have hardly left when Dante is struck with terror by two bodiless voices that break upon them like thunder. The voices are THE REIN OF ENVY. The first is THE VOICE OF CAIN lamenting that he is forever cut off from mankind. The second is THE VOICE OF AGLAUROS, who was changed to stone as a consequence of her envy of her sister.

  Virgil concludes the Canto with a denunciation of mankind’s stubborn refusal to heed the glory of the Heavens and to prepare for eternal Grace.

  “Who do you think that is? He roams our hill

  before death gives him wings, and he’s left free

  to shut his eyes or open them at will.”

  “I don’t know, but I know he’s not alone. Ask him—you’re nearer—but put in a way that won’t offend him. Take a careful tone.”

  Thus, on my right, and leaning head to head,

  two of those spirits were discussing me.

  Then they turned up their faces, and one said:

  “O soul that though locked fast within the flesh

  still makes its way toward Heaven’s blessedness,

  in charity, give comfort to our wish:

  tell us your name and city, for your climb

  fills us with awe at such a gift of grace

  as never has been seen up to this time.”

  And I: “In Falterona lies the source

  of a brook that grows and winds through Tuscany

  till a hundred miles will not contain its course.

  From its banks I bring this flesh. As for my name—

  to tell you who I am would serve no purpose:

  I have as yet won very little fame.”

  And the first spirit: “If I rightly weigh

  your words upon the balance of my mind,

  it is the Arno you intend to say.”

  And the other to him: “Why is he so careful

  to avoid the river’s name? He speaks as men do

  when they refer to things too foul or fear
ful.”

  To which the shade he had addressed replied:

  “That I don’t know; but it would be a mercy

  if even the name of such a valley died.

  From its source high in the great range that outsoars

  almost all others (from whose chain Pelorus

  was cut away), to the point where it restores

  in endless soft surrender what the sun

  draws from the deep to fall again as rain,

  that every rill and river may flow on,

  men run from virtue as if from a foe

  or poisonous snake. Either the land is cursed,

  or long-corrupted custom drives them so.

  And curse or custom so transform all men

  who live there in that miserable valley,

  one would believe they fed in Circe’s pen.

  It sets its first weak course among sour swine,

  indecent beasts more fit to grub and grunt

  for acorns than to sit to bread and wine.

  It finds next, as it flows down and fills out,

  a pack of curs, their snarl worse than their bite;

  and in contempt it turns aside its snout.

  Down, down it flows, and as the dogs grow fewer

  the wolves grow thicker on the widening banks

  of that accursed and God-forsaken sewer.

  It drops through darkened gorges, then, to find

  the foxes in their lairs, so full of fraud

  they fear no trap set by a mortal mind.

  Nor will I, though this man hear what I say,

  hold back the prophecy revealed to me;

  for well may he recall it on his way.

  I see your grandson riding to the chase.

  He hunts the wolves that prowl by the fierce river.

  He has become the terror of that place.

  He sells their living flesh, then—shame on shame—

  the old beast slaughters them himself, for sport.

  Many will die, and with them, his good name.

  He comes from that sad wood covered with gore,

  and leaves it in such ruin, a thousand years

  will not serve to restock its groves once more.”

  Just as a man to whom bad chance announces

  a dreadful ill, distorts his face in grief,

  no matter from what quarter the hurt pounces—

  just so that shade, who had half turned his head

  better to listen, showed his shock and pain

  when he had registered what the other said.

  So moved by one’s words and the other’s face,

  I longed to know their names. I asked them, therefore,

  phrasing my plea with prayers to win their grace;

  at which the spokesman of the two replied:

  “You beg me of my good grace that I grant you

  what I have asked of you and been denied;

  but God has willed His favor to shine forth

  so greatly in you, I cannot be meager:

  Guido del Duca was my name on earth.

  The fires of envy raged so in my blood

  that I turned livid if I chanced to see

  another man rejoice in his own good.

  This seed I sowed; this sad straw I reap here.

  O humankind, why do you set your hearts

  on what it is forbidden you to share?

  This is Rinier, the honor and the pride

  of the house of the Calboli, of which no one

  inherited his merit when he died.

  Nor in that war-torn land whose boundary-lines

  the sea and the Reno draw to the east and west;

  and, north and south, the Po and the Apennines,

  is his the only house that seems to be

  bred bare of those accomplishments and merits

  which are the good and truth of chivalry.

  For the land has lost the good of hoe and plow,

  and poisonous thorns so choke it that long years

  of cultivation would scarce clear it now.

  Where is Mainardi? Have you lost the seed

  of Lizio? Traversaro? di Carpigna?

  O Romagnoles changed to a bastard breed!

  When will a Fabbro evermore take root

  in all Bologna? or in Faenza, a Fosco?—

  who was his little plant’s most noble shoot.

  O Tuscan, can I speak without a tear

  of Ugolino d’Azzo and Guido da Prata,

  who shared our time on earth? and with them there

  Federico di Tignoso and his train?

  the house of the Traversari and the Anastagi,

  both heirless now? or, dry-eyed, think again

  of knights and ladies, of the court and field

  that bonded us in love and courtesy

  where now all hearts are savagely self-sealed?

  O Brettinoro, why do you delay?

  Your lords and many more have fled your guilt;

  and why, like them, will you not melt away?

  Bagnacaval does well to have no heirs;

  and Castrocaro badly, and Conio worse

  in bothering to breed such Counts as theirs.

  The Pagani will do well enough, all told,

  when once their fiend is gone, but not so well

  their name will ever again shine as pure gold.

  O Ugolin de’ Fantolini, your name

  remains secure, since you have none to bear it

  and, in degeneracy, bring it to shame.

  But leave me, Tuscan, I am more inclined

  to spell my grief in tears now than in words;

  for speaking thus has wrung my heart and mind.”

  We knew those dear souls heard us go away.

  Their silence, therefore, served as our assurance

  that, leaving them, we had not gone astray.

  We had scarce left those spirits to their prayer,

  when suddenly a voice that ripped like lightning

  struck at us with a cry that split the air:

  “All men are my destroyers!” It rolled past

  as thunder rolls away into the sky

  if the cloud bursts to rain in the first blast.

  Our ears were scarcely settled from that burst

  when lo, the second broke, with such a crash

  it seemed the following thunder of the first:

  “I am Aglauros who was turned to stone!”

  Whereat, to cower in Virgil’s arms, I took

  a step to my right instead of going on.

  The air had fallen still on every hand

  when Virgil said: “That was the iron bit

  that ought to hold men hard to God’s command.

  But still you gulp the Hellbait hook and all

  and the Old Adversary reels you in.

  Small good to you is either curb or call.

  The Heavens cry to you, and all around

  your stubborn souls, wheel their eternal glory,

  and yet you keep your eyes fixed on the ground.

  And for each turning from the joys of Love

  the All-Discerning flails you from above.”

  NOTES

  16. Falterona: One of the major peaks of the Tuscan Apennines. It is northeast of Florence and both the Arno and the Tiber spring from its sides.

  18. a hundred miles: “Hundred” is used here as a large round number; the Arno with all its windings has a course of at least a hundred and fifty miles.

  22-24. If I rightly weigh: The first spirit is Guido (see below). He does most of the talking here and hereafter. Dante has answered in words that run like a riddle, and Guido, knowing that Falterona gives rise to both the Arno and the Tiber, has to weigh out his own conclusion. He would have decided that Dante meant the Arno because the Tiber is so much longer that “a hundred miles” would be out of all reason for its length.

  31-36. The gist of these lines may be stated as: “From the Arno’s source to the point at which it enters the sea
.” the great range: The Apennines. Pelorus: A mountain in Sicily, part of the Apennine system, but cut off from the rest of the chain by the Straits of Messina.

  42. they fed in Circe’s pen: Circe changed men into beasts of various kinds. Guido goes on to specify four species of beasts into which the Arno transforms the people along its course: the swine of the Casentine, the curs of Arezzo, the wolves of Florence, and the foxes of Pisa.