On a barren, sandy plain, naked spirits suffer under showers of flakes of fire. Blasphemers lie flat on their backs, sodomites keep moving, and usurers crouch with purses strung from their necks.
Blake
Descending past the Minotaur of Crete, they reach a group of centaurs and travel on past famous killers, into a wood of thorn trees of those who committed suicide.
The three Furies appear on top of the gate to Dis, and try to turn Dante to stone using the face of Medusa. Once allowed in, they meet some of the heretics in their burning tombs.
Is this Hecate, triple-headed goddess of the night, with owl and bats, or another of Blake’s mythology, representing spiritual beauty? A misidentified painting explained.
God seen as a master craftsman, forming the world, or a symbol of reason drawn from Blake’s own personal mythology? A painting explained.
They descend past Plutus to the circle of misers and spendthrifts rolling boulders around, then down to the Stygian lake of the angry and miserable. They cross the Styx in Phlegyas’ boat.
Gates opened in time of war, entered by Christ in triumph, those of hell in Dante and Milton, separating lovers, and marking the start of an elopement.
Ancient paint made using glue as a binder loses chromatic intensity as it dries, fades readily over time, and forms a fragile paint layer. But it has been popular at times.
First Dante and Virgil have to negotiate the three-headed monster dog Cerberus, guarding Hell, then the stinking mud containing gluttons.
Passing Minos, who directs the dead to the right circle for their sins, they enter the circle for those guilty of lust. There they hear the story of Paolo and Francesca and their violent deaths.
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