The Ninth Circle Of Hell

Improved Essays
Instead of a fiery portrayal as in the rest of the circles, the deepest stratum of hell is icy and frozen. In the Ninth Circle of Hell, the sinners are either murderers or traitors, and their punishment reflects their depravity. In Round 3 of the this Circle, the murderers/traitors of guests are encased in ice, all except for half their faces above the ice and their tears creating a frosty layer covering their eyes. These sinners are part of the frozen lake, Cocytus, because their act of betrayal was voluntary and each cold soul is now too powerless to repent for their sins. Here, Friar Alberigo and Branca d’Oria committed such a sin of betrayal to their guests on Earth that their tormented souls are in Hell, while demons inhabit their bodies

Related Documents

  • Superior Essays

    According to Dante, Hell exists to punish those who have sinned; each of the different punishments located in the various circles testify to the heavenly immaculateness that sins disrupt. The inscription over the gateway to Hell…

    • 1281 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    And that was Dante the Author who chose him to represent the third circle of Hell. But still, up till this point in Hell, Dante is sympathetic to the sinners and feels sorry for their sufferings. However, Dante starts to lose some of his compassion beginning with fifth circle – Anger. Here, the wrathful are fighting each other, and Dante, was attacked by one of them, and had nothing to do, but to defend himself. His behavior and his action…

    • 826 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    An Infernal Predicament Many people are intimidated by hell, yet Dante uncovers the after life, as he perceives it to be. Dante’s Inferno is an interpretation in guiding one through the importance of fulfilling a morally virtuous, Christian-belief enduring lifespan. Circle I, Limbo, is a valley filled with souls who allegedly never did anything morally wrong, but were not baptized and therefore not allowed into heaven. Dante’s beliefs in Inferno upon salvation, the afterlife and sinful nature contradict the Biblical perspective, while agreeing with the Bible on contrapasso and just judgment.…

    • 1386 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Dante creates a certain type of connection between a soul’s sin on Earth and, the punishment he or she shall receive in Hell. This idea provides many of Inferno’s moments of the imagery between good and evil, the symbolic power of each circle and what it represents, not only to Dante but the reader; as well as shedding a light on one of Dante’s major themes expressed throughout the book: the perfection of God’s justice. “The inscription over the gates of Hell in Canto III explicitly states that God was moved to create Hell by Justice (Canto III.7)”. Hell, therefore, only exists to punish sin, and to specify the punishments to testify the divine perfection that all sinners violate. “The Divine Comedy is structured around the seven deadly sins.…

    • 302 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The Roman poet, Virgil, guides him through hell (Inferno) and purgatory (Purgatorio), while his lost love, Beatrice, guides him through heaven (Paradiso). In Inferno, there are various types of sinners in their various states. There's nine circles of hell, each circle is reserved for those who committed different sins. Virgil leads Dante up the Mount of Purgatory through the seven levels of suffering in spiritual growth. Beatrice represents divine Enlightenment and leads him through the nine levels of heaven.…

    • 470 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    Hell In Dante's Inferno

    • 1060 Words
    • 5 Pages

    Inferno, written by Dante Alighieri, explains the layout of Hell according to Dante himself. There are many circles and rings that house sinners based on the type and severity of their sins. Achilles, Brutus, and Attila the Hun are a few of the well-known figures mentioned during Dante's journey through Hell. The Canterbury Tales, written by Geoffrey Chaucer, is a compiled collection of the tales of 29 people embarking on a pilgrimage. One of the people, the Wife of Bath, is purposely made to stand out during the General Prologue.…

    • 1060 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Within the eight circle, in the ninth and final bolgia, the schismatics are located. The sin of schism is considered greater than heresy as they go against the unity of God by splitting into other beliefs and creating scandal and rift. The retribution the sinners suffer is getting being split and mutilated, the same way they split from God’s grace. The devil himself cuts each sinner with his sword, allowing them to heal to slice them once again. In the ninth bolgia, Dante encounters Muhammad, disemboweled for promoting Islam and causing a division among God’s followers.…

    • 1282 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Inferno, written by Dante Alighieri, follows his journey through Hell as he learns the fates of those damned to suffer in each region of Hell. Guided by former poet Virgil, Dante learns of the idea of “counter punishment” that dictates the relationship between sin and punishment. This construct is seen throughout the circles of hell, but there are those that fit so perfectly with the sin that the damned souls have committed. One prime example of this is in Canto XIII, here Dante travels through a dark and gnarled forest of those who have committed violence against themselves. While other circles contain very exact methods of “counter punishment”, the 7th circle, violence against themselves takes it a step further.…

    • 1129 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    While travelling through Hell, Dante describes the punishments of all the sinners. For example, when Dante reaches the Second Circle of Hell, he, “came into a place mute of all light, which bellows as the sea does in a tempest, if by opposing winds ‘tis combated. The infernal hurricane that never rests hurtles the spirit onward in its rapine; whirling them round, and smiting, it molests them. When they arrive before the precipice, there are the shrieks, the plaints, and the laments, there they blaspheme the puissance divine. I understood that unto such a torment the carnal malefactors were condemned, who reason subjugate to appetite.”…

    • 149 Words
    • 1 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Similarly, Alighieri displays acrid loathing toward Bocca degli Abbati, a traitorous Florentine, through how Dante behaves and talks to the sinner himself. In Round Two of Circle Nine, where the Treacherous to Country are punished by being buried under ice up to their necks, Dante accidentally kicks Bocca in the head as he and his Master are walking across the frozen lake of Antenora, who yells up at Dante asking why he would want to cause him more pain. Alighieri wrote apathetically, “as I trailed my Guide among those heads, my foot struck violently against the face of one” (XXXII, 76-78). Such physical infliction like this has never happened before in Dante’s journey through Hell. Despite Dante’s occasional cynicism toward all politics—a…

    • 383 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Great Essays

    Although he insults many well-known figures, he managed to rationalize where he put them in his idea of Hell and why. He even puts members and leaders of his own political parties in these different circles when he also sees them to be sinners. Although this story was an opportunity for Dante to create his own version of Hell and send his foes there, the depiction gives people everywhere of how it might possibly…

    • 1550 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Throughout time, literary works have always focused on a theme or lesson to be learned. The Inferno by Dante Alighieri is a literary work describing Hell and the sinners that have made it there. In The Inferno, Dante shows that His justice is deserved through the biblical allusion snakes and what they represent. Hell is depicted in The Inferno by nine levels and some levels have sublevels.…

    • 707 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Dante's Inferno Circle

    • 364 Words
    • 2 Pages

    In each circle the souls of the sinners are forced into punishments that fit their sin on earth. In almost each circle, Dante finds people he knew or knew about on earth. Limbo contains all the people born before christ and therefore, are neither punished or sent to heaven. Here lies Homer, Socrates, Plato, Virgil, and many more. In the lust circle, souls are blown about in a violent storm…

    • 364 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    Tiresias is located on 8th circle of Hell. This circle is called the Fortune tellers and Diviners. When Dante first looks down upon the circle, he notices that the people that are in here were walking funny and they could not see straight ahead of them. Virgil sheds light on the punishment that these poor unfortunate souls had to go through. The introduction to the circle states that, “their punishment is to have their heads turned backwards on their bodied and to be compelled to walk backwards for all eternity, their eyes blinded by tears” (Dante pg.…

    • 1048 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Since the existence of human beings on the earth, it is not clear that there is a distinction between physical body and soul of an individual, but many people across many cultures believe that there is a distinction between them. In a poem Inferno written by Dante Alighieri, the author creates a hierarchy between sins and punishment. The author explained the relationship between the sins of soul and the punishment it will receive in the hereafter. The dominant theme presented is the perfection of God and his decisions in justice. According to the author hell exists and it was created by God with the purpose of punishing sins.…

    • 1359 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Improved Essays