Al fine de le sue parole il ladro
le mani alzò con amendue le fiche,
gridando: “Togli, Dio, ch'a te le squadro!”
Da indi in qua mi fuor le serpi amiche,
perch' una li s'avvolse allora al collo,
come dicesse “Non vo' che più diche”;
e un'altra a le braccia, e rilegollo,
ribadendo sé stessa si dinanzi,
che non potea con esse dare un crollo.
Ahi Pistoia, Pistoia, ché non stanzi
d'incenerarti sì che più non duri,
poi che 'n mal fare il seme tuo avanzi?
Per tutt' i cerchi de lo 'nferno scuri
non vidi spirto in Dio tanto superbo,
non quel che cadde a Tebe giù da' muri.
El si fuggì che non parlò più verbo;
e io vidi un centauro pien di rabbia
venir chiamando: “Ov' è, ov' è l'acerbo?”
Maremma non cred' io che tante n'abbia,
quante bisce elli avea su per la groppa
infin ove comincia nostra labbia.
Sovra le spalle, dietro da la coppa,
con l'ali aperte li giacea un draco;
e quello affuoca qualunque s'intoppa.
Lo mio maestro disse: “Questi è Caco,
che, sotto 'l sasso di monte Aventino,
di sangue fece spesse volte laco.
Non va co' suoi fratei per un cammino,
per lo furto che frodolente fece
del grande armento ch'elli ebbe a vicino;
onde cessar le sue opere biece
sotto la mazza d'Ercule, che forse
gliene diè cento, e non sentì le diece.”
Mentre che sì parlava, ed el trascorse,
e tre spiriti venner sotto noi,
de' quai né io né 'l duca mio s'accorse,
se non quando gridar: “Chi siete voi?”
per che nostra novella si ristette,
e intendemmo pur ad essi poi.
Io non li conoscea; ma ei seguette,
come suol seguitar per alcun caso,
che l'un nomar un altro convenette,
dicendo: “Cianfa dove fia rimaso?”
per ch'io, acciò che 'l duca stesse attento,
mi puosi 'l dito su dal mento al naso.
Se tu se' or, lettore, a creder lento ciò
ch'io dirò, non sarà maraviglia,
ché io che 'l vidi, a pena il mi consento.
Com' io tenea levate in lor le ciglia,
e un serpente con sei piè si lancia
dinanzi a l'uno, e tutto a lui s'appiglia.
Co' piè di mezzo li avvinse la pancia
e con li anterïor le braccia prese;
poi li addentò e l'una e l'altra guancia;
li diretani a le cosce distese,
e miseli la coda tra 'mbedue
e dietro per le ren sù la ritese.
Ellera abbarbicata mai non fue
ad alber si, come l'orribil fiera
per l'altrui membra avviticchiò le sue.
Poi s'appiccar, come di calda cera
fossero stati, e mischiar lor colore,
né l'un né l'altro già parea quel ch'era:
come procede innanzi da l'ardore,
per lo papiro suso, un color bruno
che non è nero ancora e 'l bianco more.
Li altri due 'l riguardavano, e ciascuno
gridava: “Omè, Agnel, come ti muti!
Vedi che già non se' né due né uno.”
Già eran li due capi un divenuti,
quando n'apparver due figure miste
in una faccia, ov' eran due perduti.
Fersi le braccia due di quattro liste;
le cosce con le gambe e 'l ventre e 'l casso
divenner membra che non fuor mai viste.
Ogne primaio aspetto ivi era casso:
due e nessun l'imagine perversa
parea; e tal sen gio con lento passo.
Come 'l ramarro sotto la gran fersa
dei dì canicular, cangiando sepe,
folgore par se la via attraversa,
sì pareva, venendo verso l'epe
de li altri due, un serpentello acceso,
livido e nero come gran di pepe;
e quella parte onde prima è preso
nostro alimento, a l'un di lor trafisse;
poi cadde giuso innanzi lui disteso.
Lo trafitto 'l mirò, ma nulla disse;
anzi, co' piè fermati, sbadigliava
pur come sonno o febbre l'assalisse.
Elli 'l serpente e quei lui riguardava;
l'un per la piaga e l'altro per la bocca
fummavan forte, e 'l fummo si scontrava.
Taccia Lucano omai là dov' e' tocca
del misero Sabello e di Nasidio,
e attenda a udir quel ch'or si scocca.
Taccia di Cadmo e d'Aretusa Ovidio,
ché se quello in serpente e quella in fonte
converte poetando, io non lo 'nvidio;
ché due nature mai a fronte a fronte
non trasmutò sì ch'amendue le forme
a cambiar lor matera fosser pronte
Insieme si rispuosero a tai norme,
che 'l serpente la coda in forca fesse,
e 'l feruto ristrinse insieme l'orme.
Le gambe con le cosce seco stesse
s'appiccar sì, che 'n poco la giuntura
non facea segno alcun che si paresse.
Togliea la coda fessa la figura
che si perdeva là, e la sua pelle
si facea molle, e quella di là dura.
Io vidi intrar le braccia per l'ascelle,
e i due piè de la fiera, ch'eran corti,
tanto allungar quanto accorciavan quelle.
Poscia li piè di rietro, insieme attorti,
diventaron lo membro che l'uom cela,
e 'l misero del suo n'avea due porti.
Mentre che 'l fummo l'uno e l'altro vela
di color novo, e genera 'l pel suso
per l'una parte e da l'altra il dipela,
l'un si levò e l'altro cadde giuso,
non torcendo però le lucerne empie,
sotto le quai ciascun cambiava muso.
Quel ch'era dritto, il trasse ver' le tempie,
e di troppa matera ch'in là venne
uscir li orecchi de le gote scempie;
ciò che non corse in dietro e si ritenne
di quel soverchio, fé naso a la faccia
e le labbra ingrossò quanto convenne.
Quel che giacëa, il muso innanzi caccia,
e li orecchi ritira per la testa
come face le corna la lumaccia;
e la lingua, ch'avèa unita e presta
prima a parlar, si fende, e la forcuta
ne l'altro si richiude; e 'l fummo resta.
L'anima ch'era fiera divenuta,
suffolando si fugge per la valle,
e l'altro dietro a lui parlando sputa.
Poscia li volse le novelle spalle,
e disse a l'altro: “I' vo' che Buoso corra,
com' ho fatt' io, carpon per questo calle.”
Così vid' io la settima zavorra
mutare e trasmutare; e qui mi scusi
la novità se fior la penna abborra.
E avvegna che li occhi miei confusi
fossero alquanto e l'animo smagato,
non poter quei fuggirsi tanto chiusi,
ch'i' non scorgessi ben Puccio Sciancato;
ed era quel che sol, di tre compagni
che venner prima, non era mutato;
l'altr' era quel che tu, Gaville, piagni.
At the conclusion of his words, the thief
Lifted his hands aloft with both the figs,
Crying: "Take that, God, for at thee I aim them."
From that time forth the serpents were my friends;
For one entwined itself about his neck
As if it said: "I will not thou speak more;"
And round his arms another, and rebound him,
Clinching itself together so in front,
That with them he could not a motion make.
Pistoia, ah, Pistoia! why resolve not
To burn thyself to ashes and so perish,
Since in ill-doing thou thy seed excellest?
Through all the sombre circles of this Hell,
Spirit I saw not against God so proud,
Not he who fell at Thebes down from the walls!
He fled away, and spake no further word;
And I beheld a Centaur full of rage
Come crying out: "Where is, where is the scoffer?"
I do not think Maremma has so many
Serpents as he had all along his back,
As far as where our countenance begins.
Upon the shoulders, just behind the nape,
With wings wide open was a dragon lying,
And he sets fire to all that he encounters.
My Master said: "That one is Cacus, who
Beneath the rock upon Mount Aventine
Created oftentimes a lake of blood.
He goes not on the same road with his brothers,
By reason of the fraudulent theft he made
Of the great herd, which he had near to him;
Whereat his tortuous actions ceased beneath
The mace of Hercules, who peradventure
Gave him a hundred, and he felt not ten."
While he was speaking thus, he had passed by,
And spirits three had underneath us come,
Of which nor I aware was, nor my Leader,
Until what time they shouted: "Who are you?"
On which account our story made a halt,
And then we were intent on them alone.
I did not know them; but it came to pass,
As it is wont to happen by some chance,
That one to name the other was compelled,
Exclaiming: "Where can Cianfa have remained?"
Whence I, so that the Leader might attend,
Upward from chin to nose my finger laid.
If thou art, Reader, slow now to believe
What I shall say, it will no marvel be,
For I who saw it hardly can admit it.
As I was holding raised on them my brows,
Behold! a serpent with six feet darts forth
In front of one, and fastens wholly on him.
With middle feet it bound him round the paunch,
And with the forward ones his arms it seized;
Then thrust its teeth through one cheek and the other;
The hindermost it stretched upon his thighs,
And put its tail through in between the two,
And up behind along the reins outspread it.
Ivy was never fastened by its barbs
Unto a tree so, as this horrible reptile
Upon the other's limbs entwined its own.
Then they stuck close, as if of heated wax
They had been made, and intermixed their colour;
Nor one nor other seemed now what he was;
E'en as proceedeth on before the flame
Upward along the paper a brown colour,
Which is not black as yet, and the white dies.
The other two looked on, and each of them
Cried out: "O me, Agnello, how thou changest!
Behold, thou now art neither two nor one."
Already the two heads had one become,
When there appeared to us two figures mingled
Into one face, wherein the two were lost.
Of the four lists were fashioned the two arms,
The thighs and legs, the belly and the chest
Members became that never yet were seen.
Every original aspect there was cancelled;
Two and yet none did the perverted image
Appear, and such departed with slow pace.
Even as a lizard, under the great scourge
Of days canicular, exchanging hedge,
Lightning appeareth if the road it cross;
Thus did appear, coming towards the bellies
Of the two others, a small fiery serpent,
Livid and black as is a peppercorn.
And in that part whereat is first received
Our aliment, it one of them transfixed;
Then downward fell in front of him extended.
The one transfixed looked at it, but said naught;
Nay, rather with feet motionless he yawned,
Just as if sleep or fever had assailed him.
He at the serpent gazed, and it at him;
One through the wound, the other through the mouth
Smoked violently, and the smoke commingled.
Henceforth be silent Lucan, where he mentions
Wretched Sabellus and Nassidius,
And wait to hear what now shall be shot forth.
Be silent Ovid, of Cadmus and Arethusa;
For if him to a snake, her to fountain,
Converts he fabling, that I grudge him not;
Because two natures never front to front
Has he transmuted, so that both the forms
To interchange their matter ready were.
Together they responded in such wise,
That to a fork the serpent cleft his tail,
And eke the wounded drew his feet together.
The legs together with the thighs themselves
Adhered so, that in little time the juncture
No sign whatever made that was apparent.
He with the cloven tail assumed the figure
The other one was losing, and his skin
Became elastic, and the other's hard.
I saw the arms draw inward at the armpits,
And both feet of the reptile, that were short,
Lengthen as much as those contracted were.
Thereafter the hind feet, together twisted,
Became the member that a man conceals,
And of his own the wretch had two created.
While both of them the exhalation veils
With a new colour, and engenders hair
On one of them and depilates the other,
The one uprose and down the other fell,
Though turning not away their impious lamps,
Underneath which each one his muzzle changed.
He who was standing drew it tow'rds the temples,
And from excess of matter, which came thither,
Issued the ears from out the hollow cheeks;
What did not backward run and was retained
Of that excess made to the face a nose,
And the lips thickened far as was befitting.
He who lay prostrate thrusts his muzzle forward,
And backward draws the ears into his head,
In the same manner as the snail its horns;
And so the tongue, which was entire and apt
For speech before, is cleft, and the bi-forked
In the other closes up, and the smoke ceases.
The soul, which to a reptile had been changed,
Along the valley hissing takes to flight,
And after him the other speaking sputters.
Then did he turn upon him his new shoulders,
And said to the other: "I'll have Buoso run,
Crawling as I have done, along this road."
In this way I beheld the seventh ballast
Shift and reshift, and here be my excuse
The novelty, if aught my pen transgress.
And notwithstanding that mine eyes might be
Somewhat bewildered, and my mind dismayed,
They could not flee away so secretly
But that I plainly saw Puccio Sciancato;
And he it was who sole of three companions,
Which came in the beginning, was not changed;
The other was he whom thou, Gaville, weepest.
Emphasizing the close relationship between the two cantos, this one begins in absolute continuation of the action of the last, as though there were no formal divide between them.
Vanni's obscene gesture to God is variously understood. Francesco da Buti (comm. to vv. 1-5) says that the gesture is made by extending two fingers on each hand (apparently the same gesture as giving the sign of the horns, for cuckoldry, but the commentator does not say so), and in this case, four fingers in all, thus accounting for the verb squadrare ('to square'), with its resonance of fourness. Beginning with Pompeo Venturi in the 1730s, most commentators say that the gesture is made by placing the thumb between the index and middle fingers. Ignazio Baldelli, however, has recently argued that the gesture involves making the image of the female pudenda with thumb and index finger (“Le 'fiche' di Vanni Fucci,” Giornale storico della letteratura italiana 114 [1997], pp. 1-38). For disagreement with Baldelli's finding see Giorgio Colussi, “La forma, il significato, il nome dei gesti. A proposito delle fiche di Vanni Fucci,” in Carmina semper e citharae cordi, ed. M. C. Gérard-Zai, et alii (Geneva: Editions Slatkine, 2000), pp. 309-13; Andrea Mazzucchi, “Le 'fiche' di Vanni Fucci (Inf. XXV 1-3): Il contributo dell'iconografia a una disputa recente,” Rivista di Studi Danteschi 1 (2001), pp. 302-15. Whatever the precise gesture Vanni made, it was not a polite one.
The serpents, according to Guido da Pisa (comm. to vv. 4-12), become Dante's 'friends' because they undo the reason for the curse laid on the serpent in the Garden (Genesis 3:15); these serpents are doing something praiseworthy despite their unappealing ancestry.
The serpents attaching themselves to Vanni reminded Tommaseo (comm. to vv. 7-9) of the serpents that kill the sons of Laocoön and eventually capture the priest himself in their coils and strangle him (Aen. II.201-224). Other commentators have not followed his lead.
The poet apostrophizes Pistoia as he nears the end of the section of these cantos devoted to Vanni Fucci. The next thieves whom we will see will all be Florentines.
Vanni's pride is unfavorably compared even to that displayed by Capaneus (Inf. XIV.49-60). We are reminded once more that sins, in any given sinner (living or dead) are often several; Capaneus, a blasphemer, and Vanni Fucci, a thief, are both portrayed as being motivated by pride against God.
It is here, at last, that we find the answer to the question the text left us with in the last canto – or so Hollander (“Ad ira parea mosso: God's Voice in the Garden,” Dante Studies 101 [1983]), pp. 36-37, has claimed. Verses 65-78 of the previous canto had Dante eager to discover the identity of the speaker of those unformed words and Virgil getting him closer to their source so that he could have his answer. The descent, however, allows him to see still other (very distracting) things: the serpents and then Vanni Fucci. The moment Vanni disappears we finally hear that voice and have our question answered. All commentators who have dealt with the issue have argued either that the voice was Vanni's or that its identity was intentionally and totally masked by the author. It seems, on the other hand, that the voice is that of Cacus, the thieving centaur, who will be named at v. 25. What do we discover? He is angry ('pien di rabbia'), as was that voice (ad ira mosso, and not ad ire mosso); he cries out in perverse imitation of God's voice in the Garden in the Bible (Genesis 3:9), asking hiding Adam, 'Where are you?'. (See the note to Inf. XXIV.91-96.) Cacus is in pursuit of Vanni Fucci, 'unripe' (acerbo) because of his sin. Later in the poem Satan is also portrayed as having fallen from heaven 'unripe' (acerbo) in his sinfulness (Inf. XIX.48), while Adam, beginning his life innocent, without sin, is referred to as having been created by God 'ripe' (maturo) in the Garden (Inf. XXVI.91). Thus, in this 'replay' of the primal scene of theft in the Garden, Vanni takes on the role of Adam after the fall, having moved from ripeness to unripeness, hiding from his just maker, while Cacus plays the unlikely role of the vengeful God in pursuit of his fallen child (see the note to Inferno XXV.19-33). For a much different reading, see Tobias Leuker, “L'acerbità di Vanni Fucci. Sul contrapasso del Caco dantesco,” Letteratura italiana antica 4 (2003), pp. 401-5. Leuker argues that Cacus is actually in search of friendship and has been denied it by Vanni, who is acerbo in the sense that he is retroso, difficult or stand-offish; as a result, Cacus is furious with him.
Cacus was strictly speaking not a centaur, but the tradition that he was one extends at least until the prologue of Cervantes' Don Quijote. Virgil does refer to him as 'semihominis Caci' (half-human Cacus) at Aeneid VIII.194, but his context is clear: Cacus is the son of Vulcan, not of Ixion, father of the Centaurs. And so Dante's decision to make him a centaur, a 'brother' of the keepers of the first ring of violence in Inferno XII, is either completely his own or reflects a tradition about which we know nothing. See Giorgio Padoan, 'Caco' (ED.1970.1), pp. 741-42. On the other hand, many details of this passage clearly reflect those found in the lengthy passage describing Hercules' killing of Cacus for his theft of cattle in Virgil's poem (Aen. VIII.184-275), dragging them into his cave backwards so that their hoof-prints would lead away from the guilty party's lair. It seems clear that Dante here had Virgil's poem in mind as his prime source and that he knowingly distorts Virgilian text: in Virgil Cacus is not a centaur; in Virgil his mouth gives forth smoke and fire (vv. 198-199; 252-255; 259) while in Dante he has a dragon on his back to do that for him; in Virgil Hercules strangles Cacus (vv. 260-261) while in Dante he clubs him over the head (see Hollander, “Ad ira parea mosso: God's Voice in the Garden,” Dante Studies 101 [1983], pp. 40-41). We have seen such willful rearrangement of Virgilian material before, notably in Inferno XX, and will see it again (Inf. XXXI.103-105), when the unseen Briareus will be described in very un-Virgilian terms (see the note to Inf. XXXI.97-105). As Rebecca Beal points out (“Dante among Thieves: Allegorical Soteriology in the Seventh Bolgia [Inferno XXIV and XXV],” Medievalia 9 [1983], pp. 108-10), Cacus was often seen as related to Satan, since Hercules was frequently understood to represent Christ. For the possible influence of Fulgentius on Dante's treatment of Cacus see Christopher Kleinhenz, “Notes on Dante's Use of Classical Myths and the Mythographical Tradition,” Romance Quarterly 33 (1986), pp. 481-82.
The Maremma is a boggy region of Tuscany, the Aventine one of the seven hills of pre-civilized Rome.
The frenetic action described in this canto is so amply described that less than fifteen percent of its verses are spoken by its characters, the lowest figure for any canto in the Inferno.
The three sinners will turn out to be Agnello (named at v. 68), Buoso (v. 140), Puccio (v. 148); Cianfa literally joins Agnello (named at v. 43); Francesco will be added, referred to indirectly (v. 151). Thus there are five Florentines thieves seen here in this bolgia.
The first of the five Florentines referred to in the canto, Cianfa, according to early commentators, was a member of the Donati family; he apparently died in 1289.
Dante's digital gesture hushes Virgil. When we consider the enormous liberties the poet has just taken with the text of the Aeneid, we may not be surprised, within the fiction, at his rather peremptory treatment of his leader. Madison Sowell (“Dante's Nose and Publius Ovidius Naso: A Gloss on Inferno 25.45,” Quaderni d'italianistica 10 [1989], pp. 157-71) argues for a pun here on Ovid's name: Dante is 'shushing' Virgil by holding his finger across his mouth to his nose (naso) and Ovid's name is, of course, Publius Ovidius Naso. The hyptothesis would be more attractive were not the context of the gesture so clearly Virgilian.
Dante's sixth address to the reader in Inferno insists on the unusual nature of his narrative – as though we needed the reminder.
As we will eventually be able to puzzle out, Cianfa is the serpent attaching itself, in a parody of sexual embrace, to Agnello. See endnote to this canto for some details.
The third of these three rapid comparisons has caused difficulty: does the poet refer to a flame moving across a piece of parchment, turning the nearer material brown before it blackens? or to the wick of a candle, which similarly turns brown before turning black? The strongest case for the former is that, in the case of the candle wick, the brown color moves down the wick, while Dante says the brown moves suso ('up,' 'along'). See Anna Maria Chiavacci Leonardi, Inferno, con il commento di A. M. C. L. (Milan: Mondadori, 1991), p. 746.
Agnello (or Agnolo) dei Brunelleschi, a Ghibelline family, of whom the commentators have little to say that can be relied upon as coming from history rather than from Dante's placement of him among the thieves.
For the 'mating' of the two thieves, twentieth-century commentators, beginning perhaps with Grandgent (comm. to verse 72), point to the conjunction in a single bi-sexual body of Ovid's nymph Salmacis and Hermaphroditus (Metam. IV.373-379).
The final coupling of the canto conjoins Buoso and Francesco in yet a third version of punishment seen in this bolgia (see the endnote to the canto). The 'dog days' are the hottest part of summer in late July and early August.
A new figure (Francesco) assaults one of the remaining two (Agnello and Cianfa have moved off), known as Buoso, as we shall learn near the canto's end. Does this 'mating' remind us, because of the reference to the umbelicus (which Adam was uniquely without), of the creation of Eve from Adam's rib, while he slept? The language of the passage and the overall relation of the scenes in these two cantos to scenes in the Garden recorded in Genesis might make this venturesome hypothesis worthy of consideration.
The three rhetorically balanced tercets perform a task slightly different from the one they are traditionally accorded, i.e., the modern poet's victorious boast over his creaky classical forebears. But that is what the first two both seem to do: let Lucan be silent with his horrible tales of soldiers slain by serpents in the Libyan desert in Book IX of the Pharsalia; let Ovid be silent with his tales of Cadmus, transmogrified into a serpent (Metam. IV.563-603), and of Arethusa, transformed into a spring (Metam. V.572-641). The third puts forward the modern poet's superiority: Buoso and Francesco do not sustain individual transformations, but exchange their very natures, one becoming the other. Is the radical difference between Lucan/Ovid and Dante the poetic novelty of the latter, as would seem to be the case? Or is it rather the result of this poet's not inventing his marvels, but merely describing them? We all realize that the first explanation is in fact correct, Dante does (and means to) outdo his classical precursors. But then we may reflect that his claim is that he is not making this up, but merely observing 'reality,' God's vengeance on the floor of the seventh bolgia. Let fictive poets yield to this new Christian teller of truths revealed, the humble scribe of God. We do not have to believe this claim, but we can sense that it is being lodged.
This, the most fully described of the various metamorphoses found in these two cantos, is broken by Castelvetro (comm. to XXV.103-135) into seven stages of mutual transformation, Francesco into a man and Buoso into a serpent. The former becomes a man as follows: (1) his tail becomes legs, (2) his front paws become arms, (3) his rear legs become a penis, (4) his hide becomes skin, (5) his posture changes from prone to erect, (6) his snout becomes a face, (7) his serpentine hiss becomes a voice. Buoso, naturally, goes through exactly the obverse process.
Francesco, not identified until the last verse of the canto, turns momentarily away from Buoso, having regained his power of speech, only to use it to express his desire to punish him, addressing Puccio (see verse 148). As for Buoso, his identity is much debated. Michele Barbi (Problemi di critica dantesca [Florence: Sansoni, 1934]), pp. 305-22, suggests that he is probably Buoso di Forese Donati (died ca. 1285).
Campi (comm. to vv. 142-144) points to Landino's and Vellutello's understanding of this Florentine verb, abborracciare, as meaning to make something of a botch of things as a result of working too quickly. Thus Dante's worries that his pen, following these never-before-observed and rapid transformations, may have blotted his page a bit when he attempted to set them down.
Puccio Galigai, nicknamed 'Lameshanks,' of a Ghibelline family. As for the reason for his not undergoing transformation, as do the four other Florentines in this canto, Fallani, in his commentary to verse 151, follows Lorenzo Filomusi Guelfi (Nuovi studi su Dante [Città di Castello: Lapi, 1911], pp. 185-95) suggesting that Puccio Sciancato, the only sinner in this bolgia who is not changed in form, perhaps represents simple fraud, also treated by Aquinas in the passage referred to in the endnote that follows.
Francesco de' Cavalcanti (the identification is not certain) who, murdered by inhabitants of the town of Gaville, in the upper Arno valley, was avenged by his relations.
ENDNOTE: TABLE OF METAMORPHOSES, INFERNO XXIV & XXV
Vanni Fucci (XXIV.97-120) serpent bites neck burns to ashes and resurrection three SACRILEGIO: theft of
and shoulders from returns in same nature comparisons: church property
rear immediately o/i
phoenix
epileptic
Agnello & (XXV.49-78) six-footed serpent turn into a new creature mutation three PECULATO: theft of
Cianfa bites head from in of shared nature comparison: goods commonly held
front ivy on tree
hot waxes
blending
burning
parchment
Buoso & (XXV.79-141) four-footed serpent exchange their natures transmutation three PLAGIO: theft from
Francesco bites belly from comparisons: fellow men
front lizard in path
man in
sleep/fever
snail's horns
Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theol. II, II, q. 66, a. 6: on aggravated theft, cited by Filomusi Guelfi, pp. 199-206.
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Al fine de le sue parole il ladro
le mani alzò con amendue le fiche,
gridando: “Togli, Dio, ch'a te le squadro!”
Da indi in qua mi fuor le serpi amiche,
perch' una li s'avvolse allora al collo,
come dicesse “Non vo' che più diche”;
e un'altra a le braccia, e rilegollo,
ribadendo sé stessa si dinanzi,
che non potea con esse dare un crollo.
Ahi Pistoia, Pistoia, ché non stanzi
d'incenerarti sì che più non duri,
poi che 'n mal fare il seme tuo avanzi?
Per tutt' i cerchi de lo 'nferno scuri
non vidi spirto in Dio tanto superbo,
non quel che cadde a Tebe giù da' muri.
El si fuggì che non parlò più verbo;
e io vidi un centauro pien di rabbia
venir chiamando: “Ov' è, ov' è l'acerbo?”
Maremma non cred' io che tante n'abbia,
quante bisce elli avea su per la groppa
infin ove comincia nostra labbia.
Sovra le spalle, dietro da la coppa,
con l'ali aperte li giacea un draco;
e quello affuoca qualunque s'intoppa.
Lo mio maestro disse: “Questi è Caco,
che, sotto 'l sasso di monte Aventino,
di sangue fece spesse volte laco.
Non va co' suoi fratei per un cammino,
per lo furto che frodolente fece
del grande armento ch'elli ebbe a vicino;
onde cessar le sue opere biece
sotto la mazza d'Ercule, che forse
gliene diè cento, e non sentì le diece.”
Mentre che sì parlava, ed el trascorse,
e tre spiriti venner sotto noi,
de' quai né io né 'l duca mio s'accorse,
se non quando gridar: “Chi siete voi?”
per che nostra novella si ristette,
e intendemmo pur ad essi poi.
Io non li conoscea; ma ei seguette,
come suol seguitar per alcun caso,
che l'un nomar un altro convenette,
dicendo: “Cianfa dove fia rimaso?”
per ch'io, acciò che 'l duca stesse attento,
mi puosi 'l dito su dal mento al naso.
Se tu se' or, lettore, a creder lento ciò
ch'io dirò, non sarà maraviglia,
ché io che 'l vidi, a pena il mi consento.
Com' io tenea levate in lor le ciglia,
e un serpente con sei piè si lancia
dinanzi a l'uno, e tutto a lui s'appiglia.
Co' piè di mezzo li avvinse la pancia
e con li anterïor le braccia prese;
poi li addentò e l'una e l'altra guancia;
li diretani a le cosce distese,
e miseli la coda tra 'mbedue
e dietro per le ren sù la ritese.
Ellera abbarbicata mai non fue
ad alber si, come l'orribil fiera
per l'altrui membra avviticchiò le sue.
Poi s'appiccar, come di calda cera
fossero stati, e mischiar lor colore,
né l'un né l'altro già parea quel ch'era:
come procede innanzi da l'ardore,
per lo papiro suso, un color bruno
che non è nero ancora e 'l bianco more.
Li altri due 'l riguardavano, e ciascuno
gridava: “Omè, Agnel, come ti muti!
Vedi che già non se' né due né uno.”
Già eran li due capi un divenuti,
quando n'apparver due figure miste
in una faccia, ov' eran due perduti.
Fersi le braccia due di quattro liste;
le cosce con le gambe e 'l ventre e 'l casso
divenner membra che non fuor mai viste.
Ogne primaio aspetto ivi era casso:
due e nessun l'imagine perversa
parea; e tal sen gio con lento passo.
Come 'l ramarro sotto la gran fersa
dei dì canicular, cangiando sepe,
folgore par se la via attraversa,
sì pareva, venendo verso l'epe
de li altri due, un serpentello acceso,
livido e nero come gran di pepe;
e quella parte onde prima è preso
nostro alimento, a l'un di lor trafisse;
poi cadde giuso innanzi lui disteso.
Lo trafitto 'l mirò, ma nulla disse;
anzi, co' piè fermati, sbadigliava
pur come sonno o febbre l'assalisse.
Elli 'l serpente e quei lui riguardava;
l'un per la piaga e l'altro per la bocca
fummavan forte, e 'l fummo si scontrava.
Taccia Lucano omai là dov' e' tocca
del misero Sabello e di Nasidio,
e attenda a udir quel ch'or si scocca.
Taccia di Cadmo e d'Aretusa Ovidio,
ché se quello in serpente e quella in fonte
converte poetando, io non lo 'nvidio;
ché due nature mai a fronte a fronte
non trasmutò sì ch'amendue le forme
a cambiar lor matera fosser pronte
Insieme si rispuosero a tai norme,
che 'l serpente la coda in forca fesse,
e 'l feruto ristrinse insieme l'orme.
Le gambe con le cosce seco stesse
s'appiccar sì, che 'n poco la giuntura
non facea segno alcun che si paresse.
Togliea la coda fessa la figura
che si perdeva là, e la sua pelle
si facea molle, e quella di là dura.
Io vidi intrar le braccia per l'ascelle,
e i due piè de la fiera, ch'eran corti,
tanto allungar quanto accorciavan quelle.
Poscia li piè di rietro, insieme attorti,
diventaron lo membro che l'uom cela,
e 'l misero del suo n'avea due porti.
Mentre che 'l fummo l'uno e l'altro vela
di color novo, e genera 'l pel suso
per l'una parte e da l'altra il dipela,
l'un si levò e l'altro cadde giuso,
non torcendo però le lucerne empie,
sotto le quai ciascun cambiava muso.
Quel ch'era dritto, il trasse ver' le tempie,
e di troppa matera ch'in là venne
uscir li orecchi de le gote scempie;
ciò che non corse in dietro e si ritenne
di quel soverchio, fé naso a la faccia
e le labbra ingrossò quanto convenne.
Quel che giacëa, il muso innanzi caccia,
e li orecchi ritira per la testa
come face le corna la lumaccia;
e la lingua, ch'avèa unita e presta
prima a parlar, si fende, e la forcuta
ne l'altro si richiude; e 'l fummo resta.
L'anima ch'era fiera divenuta,
suffolando si fugge per la valle,
e l'altro dietro a lui parlando sputa.
Poscia li volse le novelle spalle,
e disse a l'altro: “I' vo' che Buoso corra,
com' ho fatt' io, carpon per questo calle.”
Così vid' io la settima zavorra
mutare e trasmutare; e qui mi scusi
la novità se fior la penna abborra.
E avvegna che li occhi miei confusi
fossero alquanto e l'animo smagato,
non poter quei fuggirsi tanto chiusi,
ch'i' non scorgessi ben Puccio Sciancato;
ed era quel che sol, di tre compagni
che venner prima, non era mutato;
l'altr' era quel che tu, Gaville, piagni.
At the conclusion of his words, the thief
Lifted his hands aloft with both the figs,
Crying: "Take that, God, for at thee I aim them."
From that time forth the serpents were my friends;
For one entwined itself about his neck
As if it said: "I will not thou speak more;"
And round his arms another, and rebound him,
Clinching itself together so in front,
That with them he could not a motion make.
Pistoia, ah, Pistoia! why resolve not
To burn thyself to ashes and so perish,
Since in ill-doing thou thy seed excellest?
Through all the sombre circles of this Hell,
Spirit I saw not against God so proud,
Not he who fell at Thebes down from the walls!
He fled away, and spake no further word;
And I beheld a Centaur full of rage
Come crying out: "Where is, where is the scoffer?"
I do not think Maremma has so many
Serpents as he had all along his back,
As far as where our countenance begins.
Upon the shoulders, just behind the nape,
With wings wide open was a dragon lying,
And he sets fire to all that he encounters.
My Master said: "That one is Cacus, who
Beneath the rock upon Mount Aventine
Created oftentimes a lake of blood.
He goes not on the same road with his brothers,
By reason of the fraudulent theft he made
Of the great herd, which he had near to him;
Whereat his tortuous actions ceased beneath
The mace of Hercules, who peradventure
Gave him a hundred, and he felt not ten."
While he was speaking thus, he had passed by,
And spirits three had underneath us come,
Of which nor I aware was, nor my Leader,
Until what time they shouted: "Who are you?"
On which account our story made a halt,
And then we were intent on them alone.
I did not know them; but it came to pass,
As it is wont to happen by some chance,
That one to name the other was compelled,
Exclaiming: "Where can Cianfa have remained?"
Whence I, so that the Leader might attend,
Upward from chin to nose my finger laid.
If thou art, Reader, slow now to believe
What I shall say, it will no marvel be,
For I who saw it hardly can admit it.
As I was holding raised on them my brows,
Behold! a serpent with six feet darts forth
In front of one, and fastens wholly on him.
With middle feet it bound him round the paunch,
And with the forward ones his arms it seized;
Then thrust its teeth through one cheek and the other;
The hindermost it stretched upon his thighs,
And put its tail through in between the two,
And up behind along the reins outspread it.
Ivy was never fastened by its barbs
Unto a tree so, as this horrible reptile
Upon the other's limbs entwined its own.
Then they stuck close, as if of heated wax
They had been made, and intermixed their colour;
Nor one nor other seemed now what he was;
E'en as proceedeth on before the flame
Upward along the paper a brown colour,
Which is not black as yet, and the white dies.
The other two looked on, and each of them
Cried out: "O me, Agnello, how thou changest!
Behold, thou now art neither two nor one."
Already the two heads had one become,
When there appeared to us two figures mingled
Into one face, wherein the two were lost.
Of the four lists were fashioned the two arms,
The thighs and legs, the belly and the chest
Members became that never yet were seen.
Every original aspect there was cancelled;
Two and yet none did the perverted image
Appear, and such departed with slow pace.
Even as a lizard, under the great scourge
Of days canicular, exchanging hedge,
Lightning appeareth if the road it cross;
Thus did appear, coming towards the bellies
Of the two others, a small fiery serpent,
Livid and black as is a peppercorn.
And in that part whereat is first received
Our aliment, it one of them transfixed;
Then downward fell in front of him extended.
The one transfixed looked at it, but said naught;
Nay, rather with feet motionless he yawned,
Just as if sleep or fever had assailed him.
He at the serpent gazed, and it at him;
One through the wound, the other through the mouth
Smoked violently, and the smoke commingled.
Henceforth be silent Lucan, where he mentions
Wretched Sabellus and Nassidius,
And wait to hear what now shall be shot forth.
Be silent Ovid, of Cadmus and Arethusa;
For if him to a snake, her to fountain,
Converts he fabling, that I grudge him not;
Because two natures never front to front
Has he transmuted, so that both the forms
To interchange their matter ready were.
Together they responded in such wise,
That to a fork the serpent cleft his tail,
And eke the wounded drew his feet together.
The legs together with the thighs themselves
Adhered so, that in little time the juncture
No sign whatever made that was apparent.
He with the cloven tail assumed the figure
The other one was losing, and his skin
Became elastic, and the other's hard.
I saw the arms draw inward at the armpits,
And both feet of the reptile, that were short,
Lengthen as much as those contracted were.
Thereafter the hind feet, together twisted,
Became the member that a man conceals,
And of his own the wretch had two created.
While both of them the exhalation veils
With a new colour, and engenders hair
On one of them and depilates the other,
The one uprose and down the other fell,
Though turning not away their impious lamps,
Underneath which each one his muzzle changed.
He who was standing drew it tow'rds the temples,
And from excess of matter, which came thither,
Issued the ears from out the hollow cheeks;
What did not backward run and was retained
Of that excess made to the face a nose,
And the lips thickened far as was befitting.
He who lay prostrate thrusts his muzzle forward,
And backward draws the ears into his head,
In the same manner as the snail its horns;
And so the tongue, which was entire and apt
For speech before, is cleft, and the bi-forked
In the other closes up, and the smoke ceases.
The soul, which to a reptile had been changed,
Along the valley hissing takes to flight,
And after him the other speaking sputters.
Then did he turn upon him his new shoulders,
And said to the other: "I'll have Buoso run,
Crawling as I have done, along this road."
In this way I beheld the seventh ballast
Shift and reshift, and here be my excuse
The novelty, if aught my pen transgress.
And notwithstanding that mine eyes might be
Somewhat bewildered, and my mind dismayed,
They could not flee away so secretly
But that I plainly saw Puccio Sciancato;
And he it was who sole of three companions,
Which came in the beginning, was not changed;
The other was he whom thou, Gaville, weepest.
Emphasizing the close relationship between the two cantos, this one begins in absolute continuation of the action of the last, as though there were no formal divide between them.
Vanni's obscene gesture to God is variously understood. Francesco da Buti (comm. to vv. 1-5) says that the gesture is made by extending two fingers on each hand (apparently the same gesture as giving the sign of the horns, for cuckoldry, but the commentator does not say so), and in this case, four fingers in all, thus accounting for the verb squadrare ('to square'), with its resonance of fourness. Beginning with Pompeo Venturi in the 1730s, most commentators say that the gesture is made by placing the thumb between the index and middle fingers. Ignazio Baldelli, however, has recently argued that the gesture involves making the image of the female pudenda with thumb and index finger (“Le 'fiche' di Vanni Fucci,” Giornale storico della letteratura italiana 114 [1997], pp. 1-38). For disagreement with Baldelli's finding see Giorgio Colussi, “La forma, il significato, il nome dei gesti. A proposito delle fiche di Vanni Fucci,” in Carmina semper e citharae cordi, ed. M. C. Gérard-Zai, et alii (Geneva: Editions Slatkine, 2000), pp. 309-13; Andrea Mazzucchi, “Le 'fiche' di Vanni Fucci (Inf. XXV 1-3): Il contributo dell'iconografia a una disputa recente,” Rivista di Studi Danteschi 1 (2001), pp. 302-15. Whatever the precise gesture Vanni made, it was not a polite one.
The serpents, according to Guido da Pisa (comm. to vv. 4-12), become Dante's 'friends' because they undo the reason for the curse laid on the serpent in the Garden (Genesis 3:15); these serpents are doing something praiseworthy despite their unappealing ancestry.
The serpents attaching themselves to Vanni reminded Tommaseo (comm. to vv. 7-9) of the serpents that kill the sons of Laocoön and eventually capture the priest himself in their coils and strangle him (Aen. II.201-224). Other commentators have not followed his lead.
The poet apostrophizes Pistoia as he nears the end of the section of these cantos devoted to Vanni Fucci. The next thieves whom we will see will all be Florentines.
Vanni's pride is unfavorably compared even to that displayed by Capaneus (Inf. XIV.49-60). We are reminded once more that sins, in any given sinner (living or dead) are often several; Capaneus, a blasphemer, and Vanni Fucci, a thief, are both portrayed as being motivated by pride against God.
It is here, at last, that we find the answer to the question the text left us with in the last canto – or so Hollander (“Ad ira parea mosso: God's Voice in the Garden,” Dante Studies 101 [1983]), pp. 36-37, has claimed. Verses 65-78 of the previous canto had Dante eager to discover the identity of the speaker of those unformed words and Virgil getting him closer to their source so that he could have his answer. The descent, however, allows him to see still other (very distracting) things: the serpents and then Vanni Fucci. The moment Vanni disappears we finally hear that voice and have our question answered. All commentators who have dealt with the issue have argued either that the voice was Vanni's or that its identity was intentionally and totally masked by the author. It seems, on the other hand, that the voice is that of Cacus, the thieving centaur, who will be named at v. 25. What do we discover? He is angry ('pien di rabbia'), as was that voice (ad ira mosso, and not ad ire mosso); he cries out in perverse imitation of God's voice in the Garden in the Bible (Genesis 3:9), asking hiding Adam, 'Where are you?'. (See the note to Inf. XXIV.91-96.) Cacus is in pursuit of Vanni Fucci, 'unripe' (acerbo) because of his sin. Later in the poem Satan is also portrayed as having fallen from heaven 'unripe' (acerbo) in his sinfulness (Inf. XIX.48), while Adam, beginning his life innocent, without sin, is referred to as having been created by God 'ripe' (maturo) in the Garden (Inf. XXVI.91). Thus, in this 'replay' of the primal scene of theft in the Garden, Vanni takes on the role of Adam after the fall, having moved from ripeness to unripeness, hiding from his just maker, while Cacus plays the unlikely role of the vengeful God in pursuit of his fallen child (see the note to Inferno XXV.19-33). For a much different reading, see Tobias Leuker, “L'acerbità di Vanni Fucci. Sul contrapasso del Caco dantesco,” Letteratura italiana antica 4 (2003), pp. 401-5. Leuker argues that Cacus is actually in search of friendship and has been denied it by Vanni, who is acerbo in the sense that he is retroso, difficult or stand-offish; as a result, Cacus is furious with him.
Cacus was strictly speaking not a centaur, but the tradition that he was one extends at least until the prologue of Cervantes' Don Quijote. Virgil does refer to him as 'semihominis Caci' (half-human Cacus) at Aeneid VIII.194, but his context is clear: Cacus is the son of Vulcan, not of Ixion, father of the Centaurs. And so Dante's decision to make him a centaur, a 'brother' of the keepers of the first ring of violence in Inferno XII, is either completely his own or reflects a tradition about which we know nothing. See Giorgio Padoan, 'Caco' (ED.1970.1), pp. 741-42. On the other hand, many details of this passage clearly reflect those found in the lengthy passage describing Hercules' killing of Cacus for his theft of cattle in Virgil's poem (Aen. VIII.184-275), dragging them into his cave backwards so that their hoof-prints would lead away from the guilty party's lair. It seems clear that Dante here had Virgil's poem in mind as his prime source and that he knowingly distorts Virgilian text: in Virgil Cacus is not a centaur; in Virgil his mouth gives forth smoke and fire (vv. 198-199; 252-255; 259) while in Dante he has a dragon on his back to do that for him; in Virgil Hercules strangles Cacus (vv. 260-261) while in Dante he clubs him over the head (see Hollander, “Ad ira parea mosso: God's Voice in the Garden,” Dante Studies 101 [1983], pp. 40-41). We have seen such willful rearrangement of Virgilian material before, notably in Inferno XX, and will see it again (Inf. XXXI.103-105), when the unseen Briareus will be described in very un-Virgilian terms (see the note to Inf. XXXI.97-105). As Rebecca Beal points out (“Dante among Thieves: Allegorical Soteriology in the Seventh Bolgia [Inferno XXIV and XXV],” Medievalia 9 [1983], pp. 108-10), Cacus was often seen as related to Satan, since Hercules was frequently understood to represent Christ. For the possible influence of Fulgentius on Dante's treatment of Cacus see Christopher Kleinhenz, “Notes on Dante's Use of Classical Myths and the Mythographical Tradition,” Romance Quarterly 33 (1986), pp. 481-82.
The Maremma is a boggy region of Tuscany, the Aventine one of the seven hills of pre-civilized Rome.
The frenetic action described in this canto is so amply described that less than fifteen percent of its verses are spoken by its characters, the lowest figure for any canto in the Inferno.
The three sinners will turn out to be Agnello (named at v. 68), Buoso (v. 140), Puccio (v. 148); Cianfa literally joins Agnello (named at v. 43); Francesco will be added, referred to indirectly (v. 151). Thus there are five Florentines thieves seen here in this bolgia.
The first of the five Florentines referred to in the canto, Cianfa, according to early commentators, was a member of the Donati family; he apparently died in 1289.
Dante's digital gesture hushes Virgil. When we consider the enormous liberties the poet has just taken with the text of the Aeneid, we may not be surprised, within the fiction, at his rather peremptory treatment of his leader. Madison Sowell (“Dante's Nose and Publius Ovidius Naso: A Gloss on Inferno 25.45,” Quaderni d'italianistica 10 [1989], pp. 157-71) argues for a pun here on Ovid's name: Dante is 'shushing' Virgil by holding his finger across his mouth to his nose (naso) and Ovid's name is, of course, Publius Ovidius Naso. The hyptothesis would be more attractive were not the context of the gesture so clearly Virgilian.
Dante's sixth address to the reader in Inferno insists on the unusual nature of his narrative – as though we needed the reminder.
As we will eventually be able to puzzle out, Cianfa is the serpent attaching itself, in a parody of sexual embrace, to Agnello. See endnote to this canto for some details.
The third of these three rapid comparisons has caused difficulty: does the poet refer to a flame moving across a piece of parchment, turning the nearer material brown before it blackens? or to the wick of a candle, which similarly turns brown before turning black? The strongest case for the former is that, in the case of the candle wick, the brown color moves down the wick, while Dante says the brown moves suso ('up,' 'along'). See Anna Maria Chiavacci Leonardi, Inferno, con il commento di A. M. C. L. (Milan: Mondadori, 1991), p. 746.
Agnello (or Agnolo) dei Brunelleschi, a Ghibelline family, of whom the commentators have little to say that can be relied upon as coming from history rather than from Dante's placement of him among the thieves.
For the 'mating' of the two thieves, twentieth-century commentators, beginning perhaps with Grandgent (comm. to verse 72), point to the conjunction in a single bi-sexual body of Ovid's nymph Salmacis and Hermaphroditus (Metam. IV.373-379).
The final coupling of the canto conjoins Buoso and Francesco in yet a third version of punishment seen in this bolgia (see the endnote to the canto). The 'dog days' are the hottest part of summer in late July and early August.
A new figure (Francesco) assaults one of the remaining two (Agnello and Cianfa have moved off), known as Buoso, as we shall learn near the canto's end. Does this 'mating' remind us, because of the reference to the umbelicus (which Adam was uniquely without), of the creation of Eve from Adam's rib, while he slept? The language of the passage and the overall relation of the scenes in these two cantos to scenes in the Garden recorded in Genesis might make this venturesome hypothesis worthy of consideration.
The three rhetorically balanced tercets perform a task slightly different from the one they are traditionally accorded, i.e., the modern poet's victorious boast over his creaky classical forebears. But that is what the first two both seem to do: let Lucan be silent with his horrible tales of soldiers slain by serpents in the Libyan desert in Book IX of the Pharsalia; let Ovid be silent with his tales of Cadmus, transmogrified into a serpent (Metam. IV.563-603), and of Arethusa, transformed into a spring (Metam. V.572-641). The third puts forward the modern poet's superiority: Buoso and Francesco do not sustain individual transformations, but exchange their very natures, one becoming the other. Is the radical difference between Lucan/Ovid and Dante the poetic novelty of the latter, as would seem to be the case? Or is it rather the result of this poet's not inventing his marvels, but merely describing them? We all realize that the first explanation is in fact correct, Dante does (and means to) outdo his classical precursors. But then we may reflect that his claim is that he is not making this up, but merely observing 'reality,' God's vengeance on the floor of the seventh bolgia. Let fictive poets yield to this new Christian teller of truths revealed, the humble scribe of God. We do not have to believe this claim, but we can sense that it is being lodged.
This, the most fully described of the various metamorphoses found in these two cantos, is broken by Castelvetro (comm. to XXV.103-135) into seven stages of mutual transformation, Francesco into a man and Buoso into a serpent. The former becomes a man as follows: (1) his tail becomes legs, (2) his front paws become arms, (3) his rear legs become a penis, (4) his hide becomes skin, (5) his posture changes from prone to erect, (6) his snout becomes a face, (7) his serpentine hiss becomes a voice. Buoso, naturally, goes through exactly the obverse process.
Francesco, not identified until the last verse of the canto, turns momentarily away from Buoso, having regained his power of speech, only to use it to express his desire to punish him, addressing Puccio (see verse 148). As for Buoso, his identity is much debated. Michele Barbi (Problemi di critica dantesca [Florence: Sansoni, 1934]), pp. 305-22, suggests that he is probably Buoso di Forese Donati (died ca. 1285).
Campi (comm. to vv. 142-144) points to Landino's and Vellutello's understanding of this Florentine verb, abborracciare, as meaning to make something of a botch of things as a result of working too quickly. Thus Dante's worries that his pen, following these never-before-observed and rapid transformations, may have blotted his page a bit when he attempted to set them down.
Puccio Galigai, nicknamed 'Lameshanks,' of a Ghibelline family. As for the reason for his not undergoing transformation, as do the four other Florentines in this canto, Fallani, in his commentary to verse 151, follows Lorenzo Filomusi Guelfi (Nuovi studi su Dante [Città di Castello: Lapi, 1911], pp. 185-95) suggesting that Puccio Sciancato, the only sinner in this bolgia who is not changed in form, perhaps represents simple fraud, also treated by Aquinas in the passage referred to in the endnote that follows.
Francesco de' Cavalcanti (the identification is not certain) who, murdered by inhabitants of the town of Gaville, in the upper Arno valley, was avenged by his relations.
ENDNOTE: TABLE OF METAMORPHOSES, INFERNO XXIV & XXV
Vanni Fucci (XXIV.97-120) serpent bites neck burns to ashes and resurrection three SACRILEGIO: theft of
and shoulders from returns in same nature comparisons: church property
rear immediately o/i
phoenix
epileptic
Agnello & (XXV.49-78) six-footed serpent turn into a new creature mutation three PECULATO: theft of
Cianfa bites head from in of shared nature comparison: goods commonly held
front ivy on tree
hot waxes
blending
burning
parchment
Buoso & (XXV.79-141) four-footed serpent exchange their natures transmutation three PLAGIO: theft from
Francesco bites belly from comparisons: fellow men
front lizard in path
man in
sleep/fever
snail's horns
Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theol. II, II, q. 66, a. 6: on aggravated theft, cited by Filomusi Guelfi, pp. 199-206.
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Al fine de le sue parole il ladro
le mani alzò con amendue le fiche,
gridando: “Togli, Dio, ch'a te le squadro!”
Da indi in qua mi fuor le serpi amiche,
perch' una li s'avvolse allora al collo,
come dicesse “Non vo' che più diche”;
e un'altra a le braccia, e rilegollo,
ribadendo sé stessa si dinanzi,
che non potea con esse dare un crollo.
Ahi Pistoia, Pistoia, ché non stanzi
d'incenerarti sì che più non duri,
poi che 'n mal fare il seme tuo avanzi?
Per tutt' i cerchi de lo 'nferno scuri
non vidi spirto in Dio tanto superbo,
non quel che cadde a Tebe giù da' muri.
El si fuggì che non parlò più verbo;
e io vidi un centauro pien di rabbia
venir chiamando: “Ov' è, ov' è l'acerbo?”
Maremma non cred' io che tante n'abbia,
quante bisce elli avea su per la groppa
infin ove comincia nostra labbia.
Sovra le spalle, dietro da la coppa,
con l'ali aperte li giacea un draco;
e quello affuoca qualunque s'intoppa.
Lo mio maestro disse: “Questi è Caco,
che, sotto 'l sasso di monte Aventino,
di sangue fece spesse volte laco.
Non va co' suoi fratei per un cammino,
per lo furto che frodolente fece
del grande armento ch'elli ebbe a vicino;
onde cessar le sue opere biece
sotto la mazza d'Ercule, che forse
gliene diè cento, e non sentì le diece.”
Mentre che sì parlava, ed el trascorse,
e tre spiriti venner sotto noi,
de' quai né io né 'l duca mio s'accorse,
se non quando gridar: “Chi siete voi?”
per che nostra novella si ristette,
e intendemmo pur ad essi poi.
Io non li conoscea; ma ei seguette,
come suol seguitar per alcun caso,
che l'un nomar un altro convenette,
dicendo: “Cianfa dove fia rimaso?”
per ch'io, acciò che 'l duca stesse attento,
mi puosi 'l dito su dal mento al naso.
Se tu se' or, lettore, a creder lento ciò
ch'io dirò, non sarà maraviglia,
ché io che 'l vidi, a pena il mi consento.
Com' io tenea levate in lor le ciglia,
e un serpente con sei piè si lancia
dinanzi a l'uno, e tutto a lui s'appiglia.
Co' piè di mezzo li avvinse la pancia
e con li anterïor le braccia prese;
poi li addentò e l'una e l'altra guancia;
li diretani a le cosce distese,
e miseli la coda tra 'mbedue
e dietro per le ren sù la ritese.
Ellera abbarbicata mai non fue
ad alber si, come l'orribil fiera
per l'altrui membra avviticchiò le sue.
Poi s'appiccar, come di calda cera
fossero stati, e mischiar lor colore,
né l'un né l'altro già parea quel ch'era:
come procede innanzi da l'ardore,
per lo papiro suso, un color bruno
che non è nero ancora e 'l bianco more.
Li altri due 'l riguardavano, e ciascuno
gridava: “Omè, Agnel, come ti muti!
Vedi che già non se' né due né uno.”
Già eran li due capi un divenuti,
quando n'apparver due figure miste
in una faccia, ov' eran due perduti.
Fersi le braccia due di quattro liste;
le cosce con le gambe e 'l ventre e 'l casso
divenner membra che non fuor mai viste.
Ogne primaio aspetto ivi era casso:
due e nessun l'imagine perversa
parea; e tal sen gio con lento passo.
Come 'l ramarro sotto la gran fersa
dei dì canicular, cangiando sepe,
folgore par se la via attraversa,
sì pareva, venendo verso l'epe
de li altri due, un serpentello acceso,
livido e nero come gran di pepe;
e quella parte onde prima è preso
nostro alimento, a l'un di lor trafisse;
poi cadde giuso innanzi lui disteso.
Lo trafitto 'l mirò, ma nulla disse;
anzi, co' piè fermati, sbadigliava
pur come sonno o febbre l'assalisse.
Elli 'l serpente e quei lui riguardava;
l'un per la piaga e l'altro per la bocca
fummavan forte, e 'l fummo si scontrava.
Taccia Lucano omai là dov' e' tocca
del misero Sabello e di Nasidio,
e attenda a udir quel ch'or si scocca.
Taccia di Cadmo e d'Aretusa Ovidio,
ché se quello in serpente e quella in fonte
converte poetando, io non lo 'nvidio;
ché due nature mai a fronte a fronte
non trasmutò sì ch'amendue le forme
a cambiar lor matera fosser pronte
Insieme si rispuosero a tai norme,
che 'l serpente la coda in forca fesse,
e 'l feruto ristrinse insieme l'orme.
Le gambe con le cosce seco stesse
s'appiccar sì, che 'n poco la giuntura
non facea segno alcun che si paresse.
Togliea la coda fessa la figura
che si perdeva là, e la sua pelle
si facea molle, e quella di là dura.
Io vidi intrar le braccia per l'ascelle,
e i due piè de la fiera, ch'eran corti,
tanto allungar quanto accorciavan quelle.
Poscia li piè di rietro, insieme attorti,
diventaron lo membro che l'uom cela,
e 'l misero del suo n'avea due porti.
Mentre che 'l fummo l'uno e l'altro vela
di color novo, e genera 'l pel suso
per l'una parte e da l'altra il dipela,
l'un si levò e l'altro cadde giuso,
non torcendo però le lucerne empie,
sotto le quai ciascun cambiava muso.
Quel ch'era dritto, il trasse ver' le tempie,
e di troppa matera ch'in là venne
uscir li orecchi de le gote scempie;
ciò che non corse in dietro e si ritenne
di quel soverchio, fé naso a la faccia
e le labbra ingrossò quanto convenne.
Quel che giacëa, il muso innanzi caccia,
e li orecchi ritira per la testa
come face le corna la lumaccia;
e la lingua, ch'avèa unita e presta
prima a parlar, si fende, e la forcuta
ne l'altro si richiude; e 'l fummo resta.
L'anima ch'era fiera divenuta,
suffolando si fugge per la valle,
e l'altro dietro a lui parlando sputa.
Poscia li volse le novelle spalle,
e disse a l'altro: “I' vo' che Buoso corra,
com' ho fatt' io, carpon per questo calle.”
Così vid' io la settima zavorra
mutare e trasmutare; e qui mi scusi
la novità se fior la penna abborra.
E avvegna che li occhi miei confusi
fossero alquanto e l'animo smagato,
non poter quei fuggirsi tanto chiusi,
ch'i' non scorgessi ben Puccio Sciancato;
ed era quel che sol, di tre compagni
che venner prima, non era mutato;
l'altr' era quel che tu, Gaville, piagni.
At the conclusion of his words, the thief
Lifted his hands aloft with both the figs,
Crying: "Take that, God, for at thee I aim them."
From that time forth the serpents were my friends;
For one entwined itself about his neck
As if it said: "I will not thou speak more;"
And round his arms another, and rebound him,
Clinching itself together so in front,
That with them he could not a motion make.
Pistoia, ah, Pistoia! why resolve not
To burn thyself to ashes and so perish,
Since in ill-doing thou thy seed excellest?
Through all the sombre circles of this Hell,
Spirit I saw not against God so proud,
Not he who fell at Thebes down from the walls!
He fled away, and spake no further word;
And I beheld a Centaur full of rage
Come crying out: "Where is, where is the scoffer?"
I do not think Maremma has so many
Serpents as he had all along his back,
As far as where our countenance begins.
Upon the shoulders, just behind the nape,
With wings wide open was a dragon lying,
And he sets fire to all that he encounters.
My Master said: "That one is Cacus, who
Beneath the rock upon Mount Aventine
Created oftentimes a lake of blood.
He goes not on the same road with his brothers,
By reason of the fraudulent theft he made
Of the great herd, which he had near to him;
Whereat his tortuous actions ceased beneath
The mace of Hercules, who peradventure
Gave him a hundred, and he felt not ten."
While he was speaking thus, he had passed by,
And spirits three had underneath us come,
Of which nor I aware was, nor my Leader,
Until what time they shouted: "Who are you?"
On which account our story made a halt,
And then we were intent on them alone.
I did not know them; but it came to pass,
As it is wont to happen by some chance,
That one to name the other was compelled,
Exclaiming: "Where can Cianfa have remained?"
Whence I, so that the Leader might attend,
Upward from chin to nose my finger laid.
If thou art, Reader, slow now to believe
What I shall say, it will no marvel be,
For I who saw it hardly can admit it.
As I was holding raised on them my brows,
Behold! a serpent with six feet darts forth
In front of one, and fastens wholly on him.
With middle feet it bound him round the paunch,
And with the forward ones his arms it seized;
Then thrust its teeth through one cheek and the other;
The hindermost it stretched upon his thighs,
And put its tail through in between the two,
And up behind along the reins outspread it.
Ivy was never fastened by its barbs
Unto a tree so, as this horrible reptile
Upon the other's limbs entwined its own.
Then they stuck close, as if of heated wax
They had been made, and intermixed their colour;
Nor one nor other seemed now what he was;
E'en as proceedeth on before the flame
Upward along the paper a brown colour,
Which is not black as yet, and the white dies.
The other two looked on, and each of them
Cried out: "O me, Agnello, how thou changest!
Behold, thou now art neither two nor one."
Already the two heads had one become,
When there appeared to us two figures mingled
Into one face, wherein the two were lost.
Of the four lists were fashioned the two arms,
The thighs and legs, the belly and the chest
Members became that never yet were seen.
Every original aspect there was cancelled;
Two and yet none did the perverted image
Appear, and such departed with slow pace.
Even as a lizard, under the great scourge
Of days canicular, exchanging hedge,
Lightning appeareth if the road it cross;
Thus did appear, coming towards the bellies
Of the two others, a small fiery serpent,
Livid and black as is a peppercorn.
And in that part whereat is first received
Our aliment, it one of them transfixed;
Then downward fell in front of him extended.
The one transfixed looked at it, but said naught;
Nay, rather with feet motionless he yawned,
Just as if sleep or fever had assailed him.
He at the serpent gazed, and it at him;
One through the wound, the other through the mouth
Smoked violently, and the smoke commingled.
Henceforth be silent Lucan, where he mentions
Wretched Sabellus and Nassidius,
And wait to hear what now shall be shot forth.
Be silent Ovid, of Cadmus and Arethusa;
For if him to a snake, her to fountain,
Converts he fabling, that I grudge him not;
Because two natures never front to front
Has he transmuted, so that both the forms
To interchange their matter ready were.
Together they responded in such wise,
That to a fork the serpent cleft his tail,
And eke the wounded drew his feet together.
The legs together with the thighs themselves
Adhered so, that in little time the juncture
No sign whatever made that was apparent.
He with the cloven tail assumed the figure
The other one was losing, and his skin
Became elastic, and the other's hard.
I saw the arms draw inward at the armpits,
And both feet of the reptile, that were short,
Lengthen as much as those contracted were.
Thereafter the hind feet, together twisted,
Became the member that a man conceals,
And of his own the wretch had two created.
While both of them the exhalation veils
With a new colour, and engenders hair
On one of them and depilates the other,
The one uprose and down the other fell,
Though turning not away their impious lamps,
Underneath which each one his muzzle changed.
He who was standing drew it tow'rds the temples,
And from excess of matter, which came thither,
Issued the ears from out the hollow cheeks;
What did not backward run and was retained
Of that excess made to the face a nose,
And the lips thickened far as was befitting.
He who lay prostrate thrusts his muzzle forward,
And backward draws the ears into his head,
In the same manner as the snail its horns;
And so the tongue, which was entire and apt
For speech before, is cleft, and the bi-forked
In the other closes up, and the smoke ceases.
The soul, which to a reptile had been changed,
Along the valley hissing takes to flight,
And after him the other speaking sputters.
Then did he turn upon him his new shoulders,
And said to the other: "I'll have Buoso run,
Crawling as I have done, along this road."
In this way I beheld the seventh ballast
Shift and reshift, and here be my excuse
The novelty, if aught my pen transgress.
And notwithstanding that mine eyes might be
Somewhat bewildered, and my mind dismayed,
They could not flee away so secretly
But that I plainly saw Puccio Sciancato;
And he it was who sole of three companions,
Which came in the beginning, was not changed;
The other was he whom thou, Gaville, weepest.
Emphasizing the close relationship between the two cantos, this one begins in absolute continuation of the action of the last, as though there were no formal divide between them.
Vanni's obscene gesture to God is variously understood. Francesco da Buti (comm. to vv. 1-5) says that the gesture is made by extending two fingers on each hand (apparently the same gesture as giving the sign of the horns, for cuckoldry, but the commentator does not say so), and in this case, four fingers in all, thus accounting for the verb squadrare ('to square'), with its resonance of fourness. Beginning with Pompeo Venturi in the 1730s, most commentators say that the gesture is made by placing the thumb between the index and middle fingers. Ignazio Baldelli, however, has recently argued that the gesture involves making the image of the female pudenda with thumb and index finger (“Le 'fiche' di Vanni Fucci,” Giornale storico della letteratura italiana 114 [1997], pp. 1-38). For disagreement with Baldelli's finding see Giorgio Colussi, “La forma, il significato, il nome dei gesti. A proposito delle fiche di Vanni Fucci,” in Carmina semper e citharae cordi, ed. M. C. Gérard-Zai, et alii (Geneva: Editions Slatkine, 2000), pp. 309-13; Andrea Mazzucchi, “Le 'fiche' di Vanni Fucci (Inf. XXV 1-3): Il contributo dell'iconografia a una disputa recente,” Rivista di Studi Danteschi 1 (2001), pp. 302-15. Whatever the precise gesture Vanni made, it was not a polite one.
The serpents, according to Guido da Pisa (comm. to vv. 4-12), become Dante's 'friends' because they undo the reason for the curse laid on the serpent in the Garden (Genesis 3:15); these serpents are doing something praiseworthy despite their unappealing ancestry.
The serpents attaching themselves to Vanni reminded Tommaseo (comm. to vv. 7-9) of the serpents that kill the sons of Laocoön and eventually capture the priest himself in their coils and strangle him (Aen. II.201-224). Other commentators have not followed his lead.
The poet apostrophizes Pistoia as he nears the end of the section of these cantos devoted to Vanni Fucci. The next thieves whom we will see will all be Florentines.
Vanni's pride is unfavorably compared even to that displayed by Capaneus (Inf. XIV.49-60). We are reminded once more that sins, in any given sinner (living or dead) are often several; Capaneus, a blasphemer, and Vanni Fucci, a thief, are both portrayed as being motivated by pride against God.
It is here, at last, that we find the answer to the question the text left us with in the last canto – or so Hollander (“Ad ira parea mosso: God's Voice in the Garden,” Dante Studies 101 [1983]), pp. 36-37, has claimed. Verses 65-78 of the previous canto had Dante eager to discover the identity of the speaker of those unformed words and Virgil getting him closer to their source so that he could have his answer. The descent, however, allows him to see still other (very distracting) things: the serpents and then Vanni Fucci. The moment Vanni disappears we finally hear that voice and have our question answered. All commentators who have dealt with the issue have argued either that the voice was Vanni's or that its identity was intentionally and totally masked by the author. It seems, on the other hand, that the voice is that of Cacus, the thieving centaur, who will be named at v. 25. What do we discover? He is angry ('pien di rabbia'), as was that voice (ad ira mosso, and not ad ire mosso); he cries out in perverse imitation of God's voice in the Garden in the Bible (Genesis 3:9), asking hiding Adam, 'Where are you?'. (See the note to Inf. XXIV.91-96.) Cacus is in pursuit of Vanni Fucci, 'unripe' (acerbo) because of his sin. Later in the poem Satan is also portrayed as having fallen from heaven 'unripe' (acerbo) in his sinfulness (Inf. XIX.48), while Adam, beginning his life innocent, without sin, is referred to as having been created by God 'ripe' (maturo) in the Garden (Inf. XXVI.91). Thus, in this 'replay' of the primal scene of theft in the Garden, Vanni takes on the role of Adam after the fall, having moved from ripeness to unripeness, hiding from his just maker, while Cacus plays the unlikely role of the vengeful God in pursuit of his fallen child (see the note to Inferno XXV.19-33). For a much different reading, see Tobias Leuker, “L'acerbità di Vanni Fucci. Sul contrapasso del Caco dantesco,” Letteratura italiana antica 4 (2003), pp. 401-5. Leuker argues that Cacus is actually in search of friendship and has been denied it by Vanni, who is acerbo in the sense that he is retroso, difficult or stand-offish; as a result, Cacus is furious with him.
Cacus was strictly speaking not a centaur, but the tradition that he was one extends at least until the prologue of Cervantes' Don Quijote. Virgil does refer to him as 'semihominis Caci' (half-human Cacus) at Aeneid VIII.194, but his context is clear: Cacus is the son of Vulcan, not of Ixion, father of the Centaurs. And so Dante's decision to make him a centaur, a 'brother' of the keepers of the first ring of violence in Inferno XII, is either completely his own or reflects a tradition about which we know nothing. See Giorgio Padoan, 'Caco' (ED.1970.1), pp. 741-42. On the other hand, many details of this passage clearly reflect those found in the lengthy passage describing Hercules' killing of Cacus for his theft of cattle in Virgil's poem (Aen. VIII.184-275), dragging them into his cave backwards so that their hoof-prints would lead away from the guilty party's lair. It seems clear that Dante here had Virgil's poem in mind as his prime source and that he knowingly distorts Virgilian text: in Virgil Cacus is not a centaur; in Virgil his mouth gives forth smoke and fire (vv. 198-199; 252-255; 259) while in Dante he has a dragon on his back to do that for him; in Virgil Hercules strangles Cacus (vv. 260-261) while in Dante he clubs him over the head (see Hollander, “Ad ira parea mosso: God's Voice in the Garden,” Dante Studies 101 [1983], pp. 40-41). We have seen such willful rearrangement of Virgilian material before, notably in Inferno XX, and will see it again (Inf. XXXI.103-105), when the unseen Briareus will be described in very un-Virgilian terms (see the note to Inf. XXXI.97-105). As Rebecca Beal points out (“Dante among Thieves: Allegorical Soteriology in the Seventh Bolgia [Inferno XXIV and XXV],” Medievalia 9 [1983], pp. 108-10), Cacus was often seen as related to Satan, since Hercules was frequently understood to represent Christ. For the possible influence of Fulgentius on Dante's treatment of Cacus see Christopher Kleinhenz, “Notes on Dante's Use of Classical Myths and the Mythographical Tradition,” Romance Quarterly 33 (1986), pp. 481-82.
The Maremma is a boggy region of Tuscany, the Aventine one of the seven hills of pre-civilized Rome.
The frenetic action described in this canto is so amply described that less than fifteen percent of its verses are spoken by its characters, the lowest figure for any canto in the Inferno.
The three sinners will turn out to be Agnello (named at v. 68), Buoso (v. 140), Puccio (v. 148); Cianfa literally joins Agnello (named at v. 43); Francesco will be added, referred to indirectly (v. 151). Thus there are five Florentines thieves seen here in this bolgia.
The first of the five Florentines referred to in the canto, Cianfa, according to early commentators, was a member of the Donati family; he apparently died in 1289.
Dante's digital gesture hushes Virgil. When we consider the enormous liberties the poet has just taken with the text of the Aeneid, we may not be surprised, within the fiction, at his rather peremptory treatment of his leader. Madison Sowell (“Dante's Nose and Publius Ovidius Naso: A Gloss on Inferno 25.45,” Quaderni d'italianistica 10 [1989], pp. 157-71) argues for a pun here on Ovid's name: Dante is 'shushing' Virgil by holding his finger across his mouth to his nose (naso) and Ovid's name is, of course, Publius Ovidius Naso. The hyptothesis would be more attractive were not the context of the gesture so clearly Virgilian.
Dante's sixth address to the reader in Inferno insists on the unusual nature of his narrative – as though we needed the reminder.
As we will eventually be able to puzzle out, Cianfa is the serpent attaching itself, in a parody of sexual embrace, to Agnello. See endnote to this canto for some details.
The third of these three rapid comparisons has caused difficulty: does the poet refer to a flame moving across a piece of parchment, turning the nearer material brown before it blackens? or to the wick of a candle, which similarly turns brown before turning black? The strongest case for the former is that, in the case of the candle wick, the brown color moves down the wick, while Dante says the brown moves suso ('up,' 'along'). See Anna Maria Chiavacci Leonardi, Inferno, con il commento di A. M. C. L. (Milan: Mondadori, 1991), p. 746.
Agnello (or Agnolo) dei Brunelleschi, a Ghibelline family, of whom the commentators have little to say that can be relied upon as coming from history rather than from Dante's placement of him among the thieves.
For the 'mating' of the two thieves, twentieth-century commentators, beginning perhaps with Grandgent (comm. to verse 72), point to the conjunction in a single bi-sexual body of Ovid's nymph Salmacis and Hermaphroditus (Metam. IV.373-379).
The final coupling of the canto conjoins Buoso and Francesco in yet a third version of punishment seen in this bolgia (see the endnote to the canto). The 'dog days' are the hottest part of summer in late July and early August.
A new figure (Francesco) assaults one of the remaining two (Agnello and Cianfa have moved off), known as Buoso, as we shall learn near the canto's end. Does this 'mating' remind us, because of the reference to the umbelicus (which Adam was uniquely without), of the creation of Eve from Adam's rib, while he slept? The language of the passage and the overall relation of the scenes in these two cantos to scenes in the Garden recorded in Genesis might make this venturesome hypothesis worthy of consideration.
The three rhetorically balanced tercets perform a task slightly different from the one they are traditionally accorded, i.e., the modern poet's victorious boast over his creaky classical forebears. But that is what the first two both seem to do: let Lucan be silent with his horrible tales of soldiers slain by serpents in the Libyan desert in Book IX of the Pharsalia; let Ovid be silent with his tales of Cadmus, transmogrified into a serpent (Metam. IV.563-603), and of Arethusa, transformed into a spring (Metam. V.572-641). The third puts forward the modern poet's superiority: Buoso and Francesco do not sustain individual transformations, but exchange their very natures, one becoming the other. Is the radical difference between Lucan/Ovid and Dante the poetic novelty of the latter, as would seem to be the case? Or is it rather the result of this poet's not inventing his marvels, but merely describing them? We all realize that the first explanation is in fact correct, Dante does (and means to) outdo his classical precursors. But then we may reflect that his claim is that he is not making this up, but merely observing 'reality,' God's vengeance on the floor of the seventh bolgia. Let fictive poets yield to this new Christian teller of truths revealed, the humble scribe of God. We do not have to believe this claim, but we can sense that it is being lodged.
This, the most fully described of the various metamorphoses found in these two cantos, is broken by Castelvetro (comm. to XXV.103-135) into seven stages of mutual transformation, Francesco into a man and Buoso into a serpent. The former becomes a man as follows: (1) his tail becomes legs, (2) his front paws become arms, (3) his rear legs become a penis, (4) his hide becomes skin, (5) his posture changes from prone to erect, (6) his snout becomes a face, (7) his serpentine hiss becomes a voice. Buoso, naturally, goes through exactly the obverse process.
Francesco, not identified until the last verse of the canto, turns momentarily away from Buoso, having regained his power of speech, only to use it to express his desire to punish him, addressing Puccio (see verse 148). As for Buoso, his identity is much debated. Michele Barbi (Problemi di critica dantesca [Florence: Sansoni, 1934]), pp. 305-22, suggests that he is probably Buoso di Forese Donati (died ca. 1285).
Campi (comm. to vv. 142-144) points to Landino's and Vellutello's understanding of this Florentine verb, abborracciare, as meaning to make something of a botch of things as a result of working too quickly. Thus Dante's worries that his pen, following these never-before-observed and rapid transformations, may have blotted his page a bit when he attempted to set them down.
Puccio Galigai, nicknamed 'Lameshanks,' of a Ghibelline family. As for the reason for his not undergoing transformation, as do the four other Florentines in this canto, Fallani, in his commentary to verse 151, follows Lorenzo Filomusi Guelfi (Nuovi studi su Dante [Città di Castello: Lapi, 1911], pp. 185-95) suggesting that Puccio Sciancato, the only sinner in this bolgia who is not changed in form, perhaps represents simple fraud, also treated by Aquinas in the passage referred to in the endnote that follows.
Francesco de' Cavalcanti (the identification is not certain) who, murdered by inhabitants of the town of Gaville, in the upper Arno valley, was avenged by his relations.
ENDNOTE: TABLE OF METAMORPHOSES, INFERNO XXIV & XXV
Vanni Fucci (XXIV.97-120) serpent bites neck burns to ashes and resurrection three SACRILEGIO: theft of
and shoulders from returns in same nature comparisons: church property
rear immediately o/i
phoenix
epileptic
Agnello & (XXV.49-78) six-footed serpent turn into a new creature mutation three PECULATO: theft of
Cianfa bites head from in of shared nature comparison: goods commonly held
front ivy on tree
hot waxes
blending
burning
parchment
Buoso & (XXV.79-141) four-footed serpent exchange their natures transmutation three PLAGIO: theft from
Francesco bites belly from comparisons: fellow men
front lizard in path
man in
sleep/fever
snail's horns
Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theol. II, II, q. 66, a. 6: on aggravated theft, cited by Filomusi Guelfi, pp. 199-206.
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