The second circle of hell is depicted in

Dante Alighieri Dante Alighieri (; most likely baptized Durante di Alighiero degli Alighieri; – September 14, 1321), widely known mononymously as Dante, was an Italian Italian poetry, poet, writer, and philosopher. His ''Divine Comedy'', originally called ...

's 14th-century poem '' Inferno'', the first part of the ''

Divine Comedy The ''Divine Comedy'' (, ) is an Italian narrative poetry, narrative poem by Dante Alighieri, begun and completed around 1321, shortly before the author's death. It is widely considered the pre-eminent work in Italian literature and one of ...

''. ''Inferno'' tells the story of Dante's journey through a vision of the Christian hell ordered into nine circles corresponding to classifications of sin; the second circle represents the sin of

lust Lust is an intense desire for something. Lust can take any form such as the lust for sexuality (see libido), money, or power. It can take such mundane forms as the lust for food (see gluttony) as distinct from the need for food or lust for red ...

, where the lustful are punished by being buffeted within an endless tempest. The circle of lust introduces Dante's depiction of King

Minos Main injector neutrino oscillation search (MINOS) was a particle physics experiment designed to study the phenomena of neutrino oscillations, first discovered by a Super-Kamiokande (Super-K) experiment in 1998. Neutrinos produced by the NuMI ...

, the judge of hell; this portrayal derives from the role of Minos in the

Greek underworld In Greek mythology, the underworld or Hades () is a distinct realm (one of the three realms that make up the cosmos) where an individual goes after death. The earliest idea of afterlife in Greek myth is that, at the moment of death, an individu ...

in the works of

Virgil Publius Vergilius Maro (; 15 October 70 BC21 September 19 BC), usually called Virgil or Vergil ( ) in English, was an ancient Rome, ancient Roman poet of the Augustan literature (ancient Rome), Augustan period. He composed three of the most fa ...

and

Homer Homer (; , ; possibly born ) was an Ancient Greece, Ancient Greek poet who is credited as the author of the ''Iliad'' and the ''Odyssey'', two epic poems that are foundational works of ancient Greek literature. Despite doubts about his autho ...

. Dante also depicts a number of historical and mythological figures within the second circle, although chief among these are

Francesca da Rimini Francesca da Rimini or Francesca da Polenta (died between 1283 and 1286) was an Italian noblewoman of Ravenna, who was murdered by her husband, Giovanni Malatesta, upon his discovery of her affair with his brother, Paolo Malatesta. She was a ...

and

Paolo Malatesta Paolo Malatesta (; – 1285), also known as il Bello ('the Beautiful'), was the third son of Malatesta da Verucchio, Lord of Rimini. He is best known for the story of his affair with Francesca da Polenta, portrayed by Dante in a famous episode ...

, murdered lovers whose story was well-known in Dante's time. Malatesta and da Rimini have since been the focus of academic interpretation and the inspiration for other works of art. Punishment of the sinners in the second circle of hell is an example of Dantean '' contrapasso''. Inspired jointly by the biblical

Old Testament The Old Testament (OT) is the first division of the Christian biblical canon, which is based primarily upon the 24 books of the Hebrew Bible, or Tanakh, a collection of ancient religious Hebrew and occasionally Aramaic writings by the Isr ...

and the works of ancient Roman writers, ''contrapasso'' is a recurring theme in the ''Divine Comedy'', in which a soul's fate in the afterlife mirrors the sins committed in life; here the restless, unreasoning nature of lust results in souls cast about in a restless, unreasoning wind.

Synopsis

'' Inferno'' is the first section of

's three-part poem '' Commedia'', often known as the ''Divine Comedy''. Written in the early 14th century, the work's three sections depict Dante being guided through the Christian concepts of

hell In religion and folklore, hell is a location or state in the afterlife in which souls are subjected to punishment after death. Religions with a linear divine history sometimes depict hells as eternal destinations, such as Christianity and I ...

(''Inferno''),

purgatory In Christianity, Purgatory (, borrowed into English language, English via Anglo-Norman language, Anglo-Norman and Old French) is a passing Intermediate state (Christianity), intermediate state after physical death for purifying or purging a soul ...

(''

Purgatorio ''Purgatorio'' (; Italian for "Purgatory") is the second part of Dante's ''Divine Comedy'', following the ''Inferno (Dante), Inferno'' and preceding the ''Paradiso (Dante), Paradiso''; it was written in the early 14th century. It is an alleg ...

''), and

heaven Heaven, or the Heavens, is a common Religious cosmology, religious cosmological or supernatural place where beings such as deity, deities, angels, souls, saints, or Veneration of the dead, venerated ancestors are said to originate, be throne, ...

('' Paradiso''). ''Inferno'' depicts a vision of hell divided into nine concentric circles, each home to souls guilty of a particular class of sin. Led by his guide, the Roman poet

, Dante enters the second circle of hell in ''Inferno'' Canto V. Before entering the circle proper they encounter

, the mythological king of the

Minoan civilization The Minoan civilization was a Bronze Age culture which was centered on the island of Crete. Known for its monumental architecture and energetic art, it is often regarded as the first civilization in Europe. The ruins of the Minoan palaces at K ...

. Minos judges each soul entering hell and determines which circle they are destined for, curling his tail around his body a number of times corresponding to the circle they are to be punished in. Passing beyond Minos, Dante is shown the souls of the lustful being buffeted in a swirling wind—he surmises that as they were driven in life not by reason but by instinct, in death they are similarly scattered by an unreasoning force. Within the tempest of souls, Virgil points out notable individuals to Dante, beginning with the Lydian ruler

Semiramis Semiramis (; ''Šammīrām'', ''Šamiram'', , ''Samīrāmīs'') was the legendary Lydian- Babylonian wife of Onnes and of Ninus, who succeeded the latter on the throne of Assyria, according to Movses Khorenatsi. Legends narrated by Diodorus ...

, the

Carthaginian The term Carthaginian ( ) usually refers to the civilisation of ancient Carthage. It may also refer to: * Punic people, the Semitic-speaking people of Carthage * Punic language The Punic language, also called Phoenicio-Punic or Carthaginian, i ...

queen

Dido Dido ( ; , ), also known as Elissa ( , ), was the legendary founder and first queen of the Phoenician city-state of Carthage (located in Tunisia), in 814 BC. In most accounts, she was the queen of the Phoenician city-state of Tyre (located ...

, and Egyptian pharaoh

Cleopatra Cleopatra VII Thea Philopator (; The name Cleopatra is pronounced , or sometimes in both British and American English, see and respectively. Her name was pronounced in the Greek dialect of Egypt (see Koine Greek phonology). She was ...

, as well as the legendary figures

Achilles In Greek mythology, Achilles ( ) or Achilleus () was a hero of the Trojan War who was known as being the greatest of all the Greek warriors. The central character in Homer's ''Iliad'', he was the son of the Nereids, Nereid Thetis and Peleus, ...

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...

Helen of Troy Helen (), also known as Helen of Troy, or Helen of Sparta, and in Latin as Helena, was a figure in Greek mythology said to have been the most beautiful woman in the world. She was believed to have been the daughter of Zeus and Leda (mythology), ...

, and

Tristan Tristan (Latin/ Brythonic: ''Drustanus''; ; ), also known as Tristran or Tristram and similar names, is the folk hero of the legend of Tristan and Iseult. While escorting the Irish princess Iseult to wed Tristan's uncle, King Mark of ...

. Dante's attention is drawn by two souls who are carried along together; addressing them directly he learns from one that they are

and her lover

. As da Rimini describes the

adultery Adultery is extramarital sex that is considered objectionable on social, religious, moral, or legal grounds. Although the sexual activities that constitute adultery vary, as well as the social, religious, and legal consequences, the concept ...

that condemned them, Dante is overcome with pity and faints; on waking, he is in hell's third circle.

Background

Dante's use of King Minos as the judge of the underworld is based on the character's appearance in Book VI of Virgil's ''

Aeneid The ''Aeneid'' ( ; or ) is a Latin Epic poetry, epic poem that tells the legendary story of Aeneas, a Troy, Trojan who fled the Trojan War#Sack of Troy, fall of Troy and travelled to Italy, where he became the ancestor of the Ancient Rome ...

'', where he is portrayed as a "solemn and awe-inspiring adjudicator" in life. In the works of Virgil and of

, Minos is shown becoming the judge of the

after his own death, influencing his role in the ''Divine Comedy''. The role played by Minos in ''Inferno'' conflates elements of Virgil's Minos with his depiction of

Rhadamanthus In Greek mythology, Rhadamanthus () or Rhadamanthys () was a wise king of Crete. As the son of Zeus and Europa (mythology), Europa he was considered a demigod. He later became one of the Greek underworld#Judges of the underworld, judges of the ...

, brother of Minos, elsewhere in the ''Aeneid''. Rhadamanthus is also a judge of the dead, although unlike Minos, who presides over a single court, Rhadamanthus is described by Virgil as flogging the dead, compelling them to confession. In describing Minos and his judgments, Dante accurately employed contemporary legal and judicial terminology, and quotations from the canto have been found as

marginalia Marginalia (or apostils) are marks made in the margin (typography), margins of a book or other document. They may be scribbles, comments, gloss (annotation), glosses (annotations), critiques, doodles, drolleries, or illuminated manuscript, ...

in Bolognese legal registers from the early 14th century. The pair of lovers encountered in the second circle of hell, Francesca da Rimini and Paolo Malatesta, are historical figures roughly contemporaneous with Dante. A member of the

da Polenta family The da Polenta family () or Polentani () was an old Italian nobility, Italian noble family whose name derives from the Castle of Polenta near Bertinoro in Romagna. History The founder of the house is said to have been Guido I da Polenta, Guido ...

, the rulers of

Ravenna Ravenna ( ; , also ; ) is the capital city of the Province of Ravenna, in the Emilia-Romagna region of Northern Italy. It was the capital city of the Western Roman Empire during the 5th century until its Fall of Rome, collapse in 476, after which ...

, da Rimini was married to Paolo's brother Giovanni Malatesta, of the ruling family of

Rimini Rimini ( , ; or ; ) is a city in the Emilia-Romagna region of Northern Italy. Sprawling along the Adriatic Sea, Rimini is situated at a strategically-important north-south passage along the coast at the southern tip of the Po Valley. It is ...

, by political arrangement. The affair between da Rimini and Paolo was discovered by Giovanni, who murdered them both in what became a widely-known case in Italy at the time. Dante was supported as an artist by the patronage of da Rimini's nephew

Guido II da Polenta Guido II da Polenta (died 1330), also known as Guido Novello, was an Italian who served as lord of Ravenna from 1316 until 1322. The nephew of Lamberto I da Polenta, he acquired the lordship of the city after his uncle's death. In 1316–1321 h ...

between the years of 1317 and 1320. Dante gives little direct detail of the story in Canto V, assuming that his readers are already familiar with the events.

Analysis

Dante's depiction of hell is one of order, unlike contemporary representations which, according to scholar Robin Kirkpatrick, were "pictured as chaos, violence and ugliness". Kirkpatrick draws a contrast between Dante's poetry and the frescoes of

Giotto Giotto di Bondone (; – January 8, 1337), known mononymously as Giotto, was an List of Italian painters, Italian painter and architect from Florence during the Late Middle Ages. He worked during the International Gothic, Gothic and Italian Ren ...

Padua Padua ( ) is a city and ''comune'' (municipality) in Veneto, northern Italy, and the capital of the province of Padua. The city lies on the banks of the river Bacchiglione, west of Venice and southeast of Vicenza, and has a population of 20 ...

Scrovegni Chapel The Scrovegni Chapel ( ), also known as the Arena Chapel, is a small church, adjacent to the Augustinian monastery, the ''Monastero degli Eremitani'' in Padua, region of Veneto, Italy. The chapel and monastery are now part of the complex of ...

. Dante's orderly hell is a representation of the structured universe created by God, one which forces its sinners to use "intelligence and understanding" to contemplate their purpose. The nine-fold subdivision of hell is influenced by the

Ptolemaic model In astronomy, the geocentric model (also known as geocentrism, often exemplified specifically by the Ptolemaic system) is a superseded description of the Universe with Earth at the center. Under most geocentric models, the Sun, Moon, stars, a ...

of cosmology, which similarly divided the universe into nine concentric spheres. The second circle of hell sees the use of '' contrapasso'', a theme throughout the ''Divine Comedy''. Derived from the Latin ("in return") and ("to suffer"), is the concept of suffering in the afterlife being a reflection of the sins committed in life. This notion derives both from biblical sources such as the books of

Deuteronomy Deuteronomy (; ) is the fifth book of the Torah (in Judaism), where it is called () which makes it the fifth book of the Hebrew Bible and Christian Old Testament. Chapters 1–30 of the book consist of three sermons or speeches delivered to ...

and Leviticus, as well the classical writers Virgil and

Seneca the Younger Lucius Annaeus Seneca the Younger ( ; AD 65), usually known mononymously as Seneca, was a Stoicism, Stoic philosopher of Ancient Rome, a statesman, a dramatist, and in one work, a satirist, from the post-Augustan age of Latin literature. Seneca ...

; Seneca's '' Hercules Furens'' expresses the notion that "", or "what each has done, he suffers". In the second circle of hell, this is manifested as an eternal storm which buffets souls in its wake; as the lustful in life acted "without reason", so too are their souls tossed about without reason. Literature professor

Wallace Fowlie Wallace Fowlie (1908–1998) was an American writer and professor of literature. He was the James B. Duke Professor of French Literature at Duke University where he taught from 1964 to the end of his career. Although he published more than twent ...

has additionally characterised the punishment as one of restlessness, writing that, like the souls in the tempest, "sexual desire ..can never be satisfied, never at rest". Writer Paul W. Kroll compared some of Dante's work in Canto V with the work of 6th-century poet

Boethius Anicius Manlius Severinus Boethius, commonly known simply as Boethius (; Latin: ''Boetius''; 480–524 AD), was a Roman Roman Senate, senator, Roman consul, consul, ''magister officiorum'', polymath, historian, and philosopher of the Early Middl ...

, noting the similarity between da Rimini's statement that "no sorrow is greater than to recall, in misery, the happy times" with the words of Boethius in ''

De Consolatione Philosophiae ''On the Consolation of Philosophy'' (), often titled as ''The Consolation of Philosophy'' or simply the ''Consolation'', is a philosophical work by the Roman philosopher Boethius. Written in 523 while he was imprisoned and awaiting execution ...

'': "for in all adversity of fortune the most unhappy kind of misfortune is to have once been happy". The depiction of da Rimini and Malatesta within the second circle inspired later works of art celebrating what has been seen as a tragic tale of doomed lovers; 19th-century French sculptor

Auguste Rodin François Auguste René Rodin (; ; 12 November 184017 November 1917) was a French sculptor generally considered the founder of modern sculpture. He was schooled traditionally and took a craftsman-like approach to his work. Rodin possessed a u ...

depicts the pair in '' The Kiss'', whilst Russian composer

Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky ( ; 7 May 1840 – 6 November 1893) was a Russian composer during the Romantic period. He was the first Russian composer whose music made a lasting impression internationally. Tchaikovsky wrote some of the most popula ...

based his 1877 tone poem ''

'' on the incident. The damnation of da Rimini and Malatesta has drawn also academic attention, often focussing on the circumstance of their affair's beginning—da Rimini describes the pair being inspired by the Arthurian tale of

Galehaut Galehaut (or Galaha ''l/u''t, Galeho ''l/u''t, Gallehau ''l''t, Galhault, Galeotto, et al.) is a half-giant knight and sovereign prince in Arthurian legend. He is most prominent within the Lancelot-Grail prose cycle where he is a noble enemy ...

bringing together

Lancelot Lancelot du Lac (French for Lancelot of the Lake), alternatively written as Launcelot and other variants, is a popular character in the Matter of Britain, Arthurian legend's chivalric romance tradition. He is typically depicted as King Arthu ...

and

Guinevere Guinevere ( ; ; , ), also often written in Modern English as Guenevere or Guenever, was, according to Arthurian legend, an early-medieval queen of Great Britain and the wife of King Arthur. First mentioned in literature in the early 12th cen ...

as the pretext to their own affair. Writers Michael Bryson and Arpi Movsesian, in their book ''Love and its Critics: From the Song of Songs to Shakespeare and Milton’s Eden'', quote a range of interpretation on this theme. Both

Barbara Reynolds Eva Mary Barbara Reynolds (13 June 1914 – 29 April 2015) was an English scholar of Italian Studies, lexicographer and translator. She wrote and edited several books concerning Dorothy Sayers and was president of the Dorothy L. Sayers Soc ...

and

Edoardo Sanguineti Edoardo Sanguineti (9 December 1930 – 18 May 2010) was a Genoese poet, writer and academic, universally considered one of the major Italian authors of the second half of the twentieth century. Biography In 1956, Sanguineti published his firs ...

cite the couple's flimsy use of poetry as a justification for adultery as their true moral failing, while Mary-Kay Gamel points to the tragic end of the Arthurian story as foreshadowing their demise: "if a Riminihad read further, she would have discovered how grave ..were the consequences of Lancelot and Guinevere's illicit love".

Footnotes

References

* * * * * in * * in * in * * * * * * {{Divine Comedy navbox Afterlife in Christianity Circles of hell Hell in popular culture Cultural depictions of Virgil Works by Dante Alighieri Hell (Christianity) Philosophical poems Religious philosophical literature Cultural depictions of Francesca da Rimini Fictional depictions of Cleopatra in literature 2 (number) Cultural depictions of Helen of Troy