Journey through the Dante Urbinate: Canto XXVI, Counsellors of Fraud

As we go deeper into Dante’s Inferno, we are now at the eighth bolgia in the eighth circle of Hell, where those who gave false or corrupt advice are punished.

As Dante and Virgil cross a rocky bridge, Virgil leans over to speak with the double flames of the souls of Ulysses and Diomedes, who are portrayed at the center. Here, the two Greek heroes, condemned for the same sin, take their punishment together.  

The fire that engulfs the souls of fraudulent counsellors burns below the bridge. In the background, the landscape opens toward the horizon showing gentle hills and a broad portion of the sky at sunset.  

Source: Ambrogio M. Piazzoni, Una nuova lettura della Commedia, La Divina Commedia di Federico da Montefeltro. Il Dante Urbinate. Commentario.

Illumination from Dante Alighieri’s Divina Commedia, Ms. Urb. lat. 365, f. 69v, 1478-1482, Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana.

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