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    "slug": "inferno",
    "name": "Inferno"
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  "parents": [
    {
      "slug": "divine-comedy",
      "name": "Divine Comedy",
      "url": "/sources/divine-comedy/"
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  "chapter": {
    "num": 33,
    "slug": "canto-33",
    "title": "Inferno · Canto 33",
    "of": 34,
    "words": 2027,
    "text": "## Inferno Canto 33\n\n\nCanto XXXIII\n\nArgument\n\nThe Poet is told by Count Ugolino de' Gherardeschi of the cruel manner in\nwhich he and his children were famished in the tower at Pisa, by command of\nthe Archbishop Ruggieri. He next discourses of the third round, called\nPtolomea, wherein those are punished who have betrayed others under the\nsemblance of kindness; and among these he finds the Friar Alberigo de'\nManfredi, who tells him of one whose soul was already tormented in that place,\nthough his body appeared still to be alive upon the earth, being yielded up to\nthe governance of a fiend.\n\nHis jaws uplifting form their fell repast,\nThat sinner wiped them on the hairs o' the head,\nWhich he behind had mangled, then began:\n\"Thy will obeying, I call up afresh\nSorrow past cure; which, but to think of, wrings\nMy heart, or ere I tell on 't. But if words,\nThat I may utter, shall prove seed to bear\nFruit of eternal infamy to him,\nThe traitor whom I gnaw at, thou at once\nShalt see me speak and weep. Who thou mayst be\nI know not, nor how here below art come:\nBut Florentine thou seemest of a truth,\nWhen I do hear thee. Know, I was on earth\nCount Ugolino,[1] and the Archbishop he\n\n[1: \"Count Ugolino.\" - \"In the year 1288, in the month of July, Pisa\nwas much divided by competitors for the sovereignty; one party, composed of\ncertain of the Guelfi, being headed by the Judge Nino di Gallura de' Visconti;\nanother, consisting of others of the same faction, by the Count Ugolino de'\nGherardeschi; and a third by the Archbishop Ruggieri degli Ubaldini, with the\nLanfranchi, Sismondi, Gualandi, and other Ghibelline houses. The Count\nUgolino, to effect his purpose, united with the archbishop and his party, and\nhaving betrayed Nino, his sister's son, they contrived that he and his\nfollowers should either be driven out of Pisa, or their persons seized. Nino\nhearing this, and not seeing any means of defending himself, retired to Calci,\nhis castle, and formed an alliance with the Florentines and the people of\nLucca, against the Pisans. The count, before Nino was gone, in order to cover\nhis treachery, when everything was settled for his expulsion, quitted Pisa,\nand repaired to a manor of his called Settimo; whence, as soon as he was\ninformed of Nino's departure, he returned to Pisa with great rejoicing and\nfestivity, and was elevated to the supreme power with every demonstration of\ntriumph and honor. But his greatness was not of long continuance. It pleased\nthe Almighty that a total reverse of fortune should ensue, as a punishment for\nhis acts of treachery and guilt; for he was said to have poisoned the Count\nAnselmo da Capraia, his sister's son, on account of the envy and fear excited\nin his mind by the highs' esteem in which the gracious manners of Anselmo were\nheld by the Pisans. The power of the Guelfi being so much diminished, the\narchbishop devised means to betray the Count Ugolino, and caused him to be\nsuddenly attacked in his palace by the fury of the people, whom he had\nexasperated, by telling them that Ugolino had betrayed Pisa, and given up\ntheir castles to the citizens of Florence and of Lucca. He was immediately\ncompelled to surrender; his bastard son and his grandson fell in the assault;\nand two of his sons, with their two sons also, were conveyed to prison. . . .\nIn the following March, the Pisans, who had imprisoned the Count Ugolino, with\ntwo of his sons and two of his grandchildren, the offspring of his son the\nCount Guelfo, in a tower on the Piazza of the Anziani, caused the tower to be\nlocked, the key thrown into the Arno, and all food to be withheld from them.\nIn a few days they died of hunger; but the Count first with loud cries\ndeclared his penitence, and yet neither priest nor friar was allowed to shrive\nhim. All the five, when dead, were dragged out of the prison, and meanly\ninterred; and from thenceforward the tower was called the Tower of Famine, and\nso shall ever be.\" G. Villani, lib. vii.]\n\nRuggieri. Why I neighbor him so close,\nNow list. That through effect of his ill thoughts\nIn him my trust reposing, I was ta'en\nAnd after murder'd, need is not I tell.\nWhat therefore thou canst not have heard, that is,\nHow cruel was the murder, shalt thou hear,\nAnd know if he have wrong'd me. A small grate\nWithin that mew, which for my sake the name\nOf Famine bears, where others yet must pine,\nAlready through its opening several moons\nHad shown me, when I slept the evil sleep\nThat from the future tore the curtain off.\nThis one, methought, as master of the sport,\nRode forth to chase the gaunt wolf, and his whelps,\nUnto the mountain[2] which forbids the sight\nOf Lucca to the Pisan. With lean brachs\nInquisitive and keen, before him ranged\n\n[2: The mountain S. Giuliano between Pisa and Lucca.]\n\nLanfranchi with Sismondi and Gualandi.\nAfter short course the father and the sons\nSeem'd tired and lagging, and methought I saw\nThe sharp tusks gore their sides. When I awoke,\nBefore the dawn, amid their sleep I heard\nMy sons (for they were with me) weep and ask\nFor bread. Right cruel art thou, if no pang\nThou feel at thinking what my heart foretold;\nAnd if not now, why use thy tears to flow?\nNow had they waken'd; and the hour drew near\nWhen they were wont to bring us food; the mind\nOf each misgave him through his dream, and I\nHeard, at its outlet underneath, lock'd up\nThe horrible tower: whence, uttering not a word,\nI look'd upon the visage of my sons.\nI wept not: so all stone I felt within.\nThey wept: and one, my little Anselmo, cried,\n'Thou lookest so! Father, what ails thee?' Yet\nI shed no tear, nor answer'd all that day\nNor the next night, until another sun\nCame out upon the world. When a faint beam\nHad to our doleful prison made its way,\nAnd in four countenances I described\nThe image of my own, on either hand\nThrough agony I bit; and they, who thought\nI did it through desire of feeding, rose\nO' the sudden, and cried, 'Father, we should grieve\nFar less if thou wouldst eat of us: thou gavest\nThese weeds of miserable flesh we wear;\nAnd do thou strip them off from us again.'\nThen, not to make them sadder, I kept down\nMy spirit in stillness. That day and the next\nWe all were silent. Ah, obdurate earth!\nWhy open'dst not upon us? When we came\nTo the fourth day, then Gaddo at my feet\nOutstretch'd did fling him, crying, 'Hast no help\nFor me, my father!' There he died; and e'en\nPlainly as thou seest me, saw I the three\nFall one by one 'twixt the fifth day and sixth:\nWhence I betook me, now grown blind, to grope\nOver them all, and for three days aloud\nCall'd on them who were dead. Then, fasting got\nThe mastery of grief.\" Thus having spoke,\nOnce more upon the wretched skull his teeth\nHe fasten'd like a mastiff's 'gainst the bone,\nFirm and unyielding. O thou Pisa! shame\nOf all the people, who their dwelling make\nIn that fair region, where the Italian voice\nIs heard; since that thy neighbors are so slack\nTo punish, from their deep foundations rise\nCapraia and Gorgona,[3] and dam up\nThe mouth of Arno; that each soul in thee\nMay perish in the waters. What if fame\nReported that thy castles were betray'd\nBy Ugolino, yet no right hadst thou\nTo stretch his children on the rack. For them,\nBrigata, Uguccione, and the pair\nOf gentle ones, of whom my song hath told,\nTheir tender years, thou modern Thebes, did make\nUncapable of guilt. Onward we pass'd,\nWhere others, skarf'd in rugged folds of ice,\nNot on their feet were turn'd, but each reversed.\n\n[3: Small islands, near the mouth of the Arno.]\n\nThere, very weeping suffers not to weep;\nFor, at their eyes, grief, seeking passage, finds\nImpediment, and rolling inward turns\nFor increase of sharp anguish: the first tears\nHang cluster'd, and like crystal vizors show,\nUnder the socket brimming all the cup.\n\nNow though the cold had from my face dislodged\neach feeling, as 't were callous, yet me seem'd\nSome breath of wind I felt. \"Whence cometh this,\"\nSaid I, \"my Master? Is not here below\nAll vapor quench'd?\" - \"Thou shalt be speedily,\"\nHe answer'd, \"where thine eyes shall tell thee whence,\nThe cause descrying of this airy shower.\"\n\nThen cried out one, in the chill crust who mourn'd:\n\"O souls! so cruel, that the farthest post\nHath been assign'd you, from this face remove\nThe harden'd veil; that I may vent the grief\nImpregnate at my heart, some little space,\n\nEre it congeal again.\" I thus replied:\n\"Say who thou wast, if thou wouldst have mine aid;\nAnd if I extricate thee not, far down\nAs to the lowest ice may I descend.\"\n\n\"The friar Alberigo,\"[4] answer'd he,\n\"Am I, who from the evil garden pluck'd\nIts fruitage, and am here repaid, the date\nMore luscious for my fig.\" - \"Hah!\" I exclaim'd,\n\"Art thou, too, dead?\" \"How in the world aloft\nIt fareth with my body,\" answer'd he,\n\"I am right ignorant. Such privilege\nHath Ptolomea,[5] that oft - times the soul\nDrops hither, ere by Atropos divorced.\nAnd that thou mayst wipe out more willingly\nThe glazed tear - drops that o'erlay mine eyes,\nKnow that the soul, that moment she betrays,\nAs I did, yields her body to\na fiend\nWho after moves and governs it at will,\nTill all its time be rounded: headlong she\nFalls to this cistern. And perchance above\nDoth yet appear the body of a ghost,\nWho here behind me winters. Him thou know'st,\nIf thou but newly art arrived below.\nThe years are many that have passed away,\nSince to this fastness Branca Doria[6] came.\"\n\n[4: The friar Alberigo,\" Alberigo de' Manfredi, of Faenza, one of the\nFrati Godenti (Joyous Friars), who having quarrelled with some of his\nbrotherhood, under pretence of wishing to be reconciled, invited them to a\nbanquet, at the conclusion of which he called for the fruit, a signal for the\nassassins to rush in and despatch those whom he had marked for destruction.\nHence, adds Landino, it is said proverbially of one who has been stabbed, that\nhe had had some of the friar Alberigo's fruit.]\n\n[5: \"Ptolomea.\" This circle is named Ptolomea from Ptolemy the son of\nAbubus, by whom Simon and his sons were murdered, at a great banquet he had\nmade for them. See I Maccabees, ch. xvi. Or from Ptolemy, King of Egypt, the\nbetrayer of Pompey the Great.]\n\n[6: \"Branca Doria.\" The family of Doria was possessed of great\ninfluence in Genoa. Branca is said to have murdered his father - in - law,\nMichel Zanche. See Canto xxii.]\n\n\"Now,\" answer'd I, \"methinks thou mockest me;\nFor Branca Doria never yet hath died,\nBut doth all natural functions of a man,\nEats, drinks, and sleeps, and putteth raiment on.\"\n\nHe thus: \"Not yet unto that upper foss\nBy th' evil talons guarded, where the pitch\nTenacious boils, had Michel Zanche reach'd,\nWhen this one left a demon in his stead\nIn his own body, and of one his kin,\nWho with him treachery wrought. But now put forth\nThy hand, and ope mine eyes.\" I oped them not.\nIll manners were best courtesy to him.\n\nAh Genoese! men perverse in every way\nWith every foulness stain'd why from the earth\nAre ye not cancel'd? Such an one of yours\nI with Romagna's darkest spirit[7] found,\nAs, for his doings, even now in soul\nIs in Cocytus plunged, and yet doth seem\nIn body still alive upon the earth.\n\n[7: The friar Alberigo.]",
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