By Dante Alighieri

Dante Alighieri Son of a nobleman Born in 1265 in Florence, Italy Mother died when he was very young Received early education in Florence Was on his own by the time he was an adolescent

His great love seems to have been Beatrice Portinari. They met when he was 9 and she was 8 He saw her frequently after age 18, often exchanging greetings in the street, but he never knew her well. Dante worshipped Beatrice, but when he was 12, his family arranged for him to marry someone else. After Beatrice’s death in 1290 at the age of 24, his first book, “The New Life” (La Vita Nuova), celebrated his love for her.

Dante entered an arranged marriage in 1285 with Gemma Donati, a noblewoman. They had four children; Jacopo, Pietro, Giovanni and Antonia. Records contain little else about their life together. One of his early sonnets Dante sent to the poet Guido Cavalcanti, which started their friendship. Dante also dedicated his first book to Cavalcanti.

All was not well in Italy during the Renaissance. Rulers of the independent Italian states often fought with each other to establish a large political unit. The Guelph Political party (which favored local authority & the Pope) and the Ghibelline Political party (which favored old imperial aristocracy) were two such rival factions.

Dante’s birth in 1265 came at a time when the Guelph party was in control of Florence. The Guelph political party, which supported Papal rule, eventually divided into two groups: The Whites (supported imperial rule and independence from Papal rule) The Blacks (supported Papal rule). Dante became a member of the Whites and served as an ambassador to talk with the Pope in Rome about conditions in Florence.

While Dante was out of town, the Blacks took over Florence. The Blacks sentenced Dante to banishment from the city. His punishment for return would be death. His wanderings gave him time to write and to study the Scriptures. This banishment also gave Dante his perspective on corruption of the fourteenth century papacy, a view that he would clearly describe in The Inferno. In Commedia Dante repeatedly condemns the Popes for their involvement in politics.

During his exile, he started to write his Commedia, a long story-poem through the three worlds of the afterlife, under the patronage of the Ghibelline leaders. About 1320 Dante made his final home in Ravenna, where he died on the night of September 13-14, La Divina Commedia was completed just before the poet's death. He probably started to write it in The Purgatorio was written in Verona, where he stayed more or less continuously from late 1312 to mid In Ravenna he wrote the final phases of The Paradiso. By the time the first two parts of the Comedy had been sent in circulation, Dante was being acclaimed through much of Tuscany as its greatest poet. Dante's idea was to make the world of his poem a mirror of the world of the Christian God of his era.

The work was a major departure from the literature of the day since it was written in Italian, not the Latin of most other important writing. Politics, history, mythology, and religious leaders appear throughout The Divine Comedy. Prominent people of the time, of literature, of the past, and of Dante’s personal life – including Beatrice – appear throughout The Divine Comedy.

The Divine Comedy was not titled as such by Dante; his title for the work was simply Commedia or Comedy. Dante’s use of the word “comedy” is medieval by definition. To Dante and his contemporaries, the term “comedy” meant a tale with a happy ending, not a funny story as the word has since come to mean.

The Divine Comedy is made up of three parts, corresponding with Dante’s three journeys: Inferno (or Hell); Purgatorio (or Purgatory); and Paridisio (or Paradise). Each part consists of a prologue and approximately 33 cantos. Since the narrative poem is in an exalted form with a hero as its subject, it is an epic poem.

The Divine Comedy is a narrative poem describing Dante’s imaginary journey. Midway on his journey through life, Dante realizes he has taken the wrong path. The Roman poet Virgil searches for the lost Dante at the request of Beatrice. He finds Dante in the woods on the evening of Good Friday in the year 1300 and serves as a guide as Dante begins his religious pilgrimage to find God. To reach his goal, Dante passes through Hell, Purgatory, and Paradise.

Dante and Virgil enter the wide gates of Hell and descend through the nine circles of Hell. In each circle they see sinners being punished for their sins on Earth; Dante sees the torture as Divine justice.

The sinners in the circles include: Circle One – Those in limbo (includes virtuous non-Christian adults in addition to unbaptized infants) Circle Two – The lustful Circle Three – The gluttonous Circle Four – The hoarders Circle Five – The wrathful Circle Six – The heretics

Circle Seven – The violent Ring 1: Murderers, robbers, and plunderers (those who were violent toward others) Ring 2: Suicides (those who were violent toward themselves) Ring 3: Blasphemers (violent towards God),Sodomites (violence towards nature), Usurers (violence toward art)

Circle Eight – The Fraudulent & Malicious Bolgia (ditch) I: Panderers and Seducers Bolgia II: Flatterers Bolgia III: Simoniacs (those who made profit from sacred things) Bolgia IV: Fortune Tellers & Diviners Bolgia V: Grafters (sell or purchase positions in church or state) Bolgia VI: Hypocrites Bolgia VII: Thieves Bolgia VIII: The Evil Counselors (spiritual theft) Bolgia IX: Sowers of Discord Bolgia X: Falsifiers, Evil Impersonators, Counterfeiters, False Witnesses The Central Pit of Malebolge: The Giants

Circle Nine – Traitors (Compound Fraud) Round One: Traitors to their kindred Round Two: Traitors to their country Round Three: Traitors to their guests Round Four: Traitors to their lords THE CENTER: Satan