The three major categories of sin in Dante’s Inferno are; lust, pride, and greed. The three beasts at the beginning of the Inferno represent these three sins. The leopard, lion, and she-wolf all are described to subtly let the reader know what they are representing. Each is similar in appearance to being fierce and dangerous but all have different characteristics to make each distinct from the other.
The leopard represents lust. When Dante describes the leopard as “trim and very swift!” (Inf.
1.32), it is representing the almost sensual movements of the animal. The way lust creeps in and is not loud and deliberate but quiet and sneaky. It comes without much warning and can do much damage without making a sound.
The lion represents the sin of pride. While it is a majestic beast and is a symbol of greatness, greatness can fall quickly when in the wrong hands. Dante describes the lion as, “with head raised high, and furious with hunger- the air around him seemed to fear his presence (Inf.
1.47-48), he is even giving the lion the appearance of greatness by saying the air feared him and he had his head raised high as a man full of pride would. The lion is furious with hunger, which is much like a prideful person, trying to fill a void in their lives with the pride they have, patting themselves on the back so that they do not have to address what is not going their way at the moment.
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The she-wolf is Dante’s symbol of greed. Her appearance is striking but the most intense part of her is what the sight of her does to Dante. He says, “The last beast brought my spirit down so low with fear that seized me at the sight of her, I lost all hope of going up the hill” (Inf.1.52-54). Her sheer appearance brought so much pain to him. The greedy she-wolf that had caused so many people grief and pain was now causing Dante to lose all hope.
The sins of the deeper circles get worse, just as the description and symbol of the beast get worse. The deeper the circles go, the worse the sins get. From the last circle where Lucifer and the worst of the worst are frozen into a lake, void of God’s presence where they do not respond to Dante because he is irrelevant to their punishment, to the first levels he goes to where the damned are having conversations with Dante so that their story and punishment can be lessons on earth to help those who may face damnation without guidance.
Guardians of Hell
The guardians of Hell all had differences in appearance and in some way, that represented what they were guarding and who those people were in the level of Hell that they were addressed. The first guardian appears in Canto V and is named Minòs. He is in charge of judgment and deciding which level of hell each dammed soul must go to. He has a long tail and snarls when he sees Dante and Virgil. He represents the judgment that all in Hell must face and for that, his tail is long and coiled, like a snake waiting for the strike, he gets to determine the fate of those who are in hell and where they go and what they will endure. “By this, I mean that when the evil soul appears before him, it confesses all, and he who is the expert judge of sins see what place in Hell the soul belongs to;” (Inf.5.7-10) Minòs is a strict judge and damns these souls to their deserved punishment.
Cerberus is the guardian of the third circle, the circle of those who overindulge or are gluttons. “His eyes red, his beard is slobbered black, his belly swollen, and he has claws for hands; he rips the spirits, flays and mangles them” (Inf.6.16-18). Cerberus is guarding the place of the glutton while being a glutton himself. He is representing those he guards through his devouring of people and mangling of souls. He is dark and gross like those he guards and he is a clear representation of the circle of Hell that he resides in.
The fourth circle is guarded by Plutus, and the circle is for those who were selfish and did not share or handle wealth well. “Then turning toward that swollen face of rage crying, ‘Be quiet, cursed wolf of hell: feed on the burning bile that rots your guts’” (Inf.7.7-9), When Virgil says this to Plutus, it explains much of what he is like and what disdain Virgil has for the guardian himself. The wolf of Hell is referring to Plutus’ appearance, he is a wolf-like in stature and most likely hungry and skinny living in hell. Virgil says that he should feed upon something that will “rot his guts” and that is to say that in hell and this place whatever these people try to hoard or keep will simply lead to more pain and suffering in their damnation. The greed of this circle is also represented through his appetite for what will never bring him satisfaction and an eternity of torment.
Altogether, the guardians of the different circles of Hell represent more than just gatekeepers. Together these all represent those who are behind their gates and when Virgil and Dante get by some of them, out represents the weakness that each held and most likely the people in the gate held that same weakness on earth. The guards are not only guarding but also being tortured just like those whom they are there to keep there.
Dante, and the Struggle of Pity
When Dante first arrives in Hell her has a problem with pitying the damned souls that cry out in torment. The idea of being able to look at a burning soul, out of the presence of God and not feel sorrow and pain for that person seems criminal. However, Dante quickly learns that Virgil is quite serious about not feeling sorry for those who had the opportunity to live right and enjoy paradise but chose to lead lives of sin and separation from God.
Dante, in canto five, struggles with these feelings of pity, “And now the notes of anguish start to play upon my ears; and now I find myself where sounds on sounds of the weeping pound at me” (Inf.5.25-27). When the damned are making noise and calling out it seems natural for Dante to feel sorrow for them. In this part of the canto, it is also pitch black, Dante cannot see what these souls are enduring. The fact that Dante cannot see their punishment makes it a strong image of feeling sorry. When a person can see what is hurting someone it is easy to cope with if that person is justified in their punishment, but the imagination can take hearing punishment to new heights that the mind should not be forced to go through.
Virgil rebukes Dante for feeling pity for the damned because they deserve their punishment. In canto thirty, Virgil gets upset with Dante for his foolish sadness for the damned. “’ Less shame than yours would wash away a fault greater than yours has been,’ my master said, ‘and so forget about it, do not be sad” (Inf.30.142-144), Dante has an argument and says harsh words to one of the damned, he then feels bad and Virgil gets very upset with him. Dante wants to apologize but in no way would that help the situation. Dante struggles with feeling sorry for those being punished and in some ways is harsher with his words than their punishments are in the first place.
Even when Dante can talk to a sinner with distaste and judgment as Virgil wanted him to, he still feels pity for them, “’ and ask him, for my part, what I would ask, for I cannot, such pity chokes my heart” (Inf.13.83-84). Dante tries to fight his human nature and at some points in the story seems to understand his place as the onlooker and not the reason that they are there. Dante’s pity comes and goes throughout the Inferno.
The Bottom of Hell
Circle 9 of the Inferno is the bottom and deepest part of Hell. When Dante gets there and all is frozen he says, “I did not die- I was not living either! Try to imagine, if you can imagine, me there, deprived of life and death at once” (Inf.34.25-27). Time stands still here, there is no death there is no life, there is no beginning, there is no end. This is the place for the worst of the worst. The bottom of hell. The place where people are frozen in ice to spend eternity without any warmth, and without any presence of light or God.
Lucifer is partially frozen here, he is chewing on Judas, Brutus, and Cassius; one in each of Lucifer’s three mouths on one of his three heads. The lake is frozen over and there is no escape from the damnation at the bottom of hell where time does do not move (Inf.34). The lake is called Cocytus, and it is the bottom of hell. It symbolizes much more than a lake to freeze people.
The lake, darkness, cold, and ice all represent more than what is said. These all represent the lack of warmth or light. God is very often referred to as the light, and as a warming presence, and while hell is often referred to as a burning place, the idea of the bottom of hell being cold makes sense. The lack of all light, all presence of God all to do with the divine creator, would it not be cold? It would be the coldest place imaginable due to the lack of all good and just.
When the reader finds Lucifer at the bottom of hell it is different than that what may be expected due to the general belief that Satan runs Hell, and is not a simple member of the torture. The reader expects for some thrown with Satan sitting upon it, but you find Satan frozen and torturing others that deserve that type of damnation. I think that this is addressing the role of Satan as an almost secondary god figure over hell and putting him in his place as another one of the separated from the warmth and glory that is found in heaven and the presence of God,
The reader expects to find the bottom of Hell as the hottest place imaginable and instead it is the coldest. The Inferno leads a reader to think that it is hot and to imagine the worst part of the hottest place ever is most likely imagined as hot. Dante played to this and ended with irony and also some suspense that was not answered. The last circler seems to go by quickly and Virgil and Dante do not seem to explore it as much as the reader is led to believe and anticipate from the beginning of the text.
The Terror of Limbo
The most terrifying place in Hell was Limbo. Those who are not worthy to be saved, and also not deserving of eternal Hell. Limbo is a place of no hope, nothing, no feeling. Virgil is a member of this group that lives on right on the edge of Hell. They are in between.
Virgil tells Dante:
“They have not sinned. But their great worth alone was not enough, for they did not know Baptism which is the gateway to the faith you follow, and if they came before the birth of christ they did not worship God the way one should; I am a member of this group. For this defect and no other guilt, we here are lost. In this alone we suffer: cut off from hope, we live on in desire” (Inf.4.34-42).
The two see these souls. The terrifying idea of not being fully right or fully wrong. That one little act like baptism, or worshipping in the right way would separate you from God forever. The people here were not evil, they were just not perfect on earth in religious ways, or they were born at the wrong time. Life is ending but their eternal desire to be in heaven will never end, and their only crime in many cases was they were not born after Christ. The small reasons for being here are what makes it terrifying that instead of eternity in connection with God and basking in His light, one must spend eternity away from that, not punished but thrown out on a technicality.
Only some of the great people that lived before Christ were retrieved from this state of Limbo. “He took from us shade of our first parent, of Able, his good son, of Noah, too, and of obedient Moses, who made the laws;” (Inf.4.55-57). These individuals were some of the greatest to ever live, if they were retrieved but those who were simply born before and did not sin were still damned to this place then there is no getting out for the damned there now. They are void of hope, emotion, and any feeling of just or fair treatment, they are simply ghosts, stuck in a middle ground that is no better than being punished by nothing or getting the great reward of nothing for eternity. Limbo is terrifying and is the root of what Hell is about even though it is seen as the least harsh part of Hell.
The Three Beasts. (2022, Aug 15). Retrieved from https://paperap.com/the-three-beasts/
