Canto 32

Summary/Analysis

Virgil and Dante enter at ninth circle next to Cocytus. First, they get to Caina, which is the area that all traitors to kindred are punished. Those sinners were frozen in the lake with the upper body revealed to Dante. There, Dante saw a brother bonded with each other and cannot separate, Sassol Mascheroni who committed sin of murdering his uncle's only son for inheritance, and Camiscion de' Pazzi who killed a kinsman. Then, they went to Antenora, the area all traitors to country or party are punished. All the sinners were punished in the frozen lake with only head up. Dante accidentally kicked one's face and got that sinner mad. Dante asked who he was and he was unwilling to tell him. The other sinner called Buoso Donati shouted to Dante that this man was Bocca del Duca, who betrayed his country for good. Bocca told Dante that Buoso was also a traitor to his country for money. He also told Dante Beccheria and Gianni de' Soldanier were next to them too. Then, Dante and Virgil saw two frozen in one hole so that one head was a hat to the other. Those are Ugolino and Archibishop Ruggieri. Dante told them to reveal their sins and tried to see if he can pardon them.

At the beginning of this canto, Dante told the readers that hell is not like a child-play and also he can hardly describe how bad it is in hell by using words. In line 37, the sinner held his face turned down, expressing the shame of him. In line 58, it is ironic to say that "from one body they were born" because the brothers ended up to kill each other just for inheritance. In line 58, I realized that Caina was actually named for Cain. Who killed his brother Abel of envy and was exiled , branded with a mark to prevent anyone from killing him. This is a representative figure to the Caina area as whole because this area confined those who are traitors to their kindreds. In 113-23, it stated that" do not be silent...when it slept". It is ironic because Bocca , whose name means "mouth" is betrayed by another of the traitors. Bocca, simply a name that symbolizes the talkative figure, reveals five other sinners' identities to Dante after himself was recognized by Dante. We see how sinful as he was!

Sin:

Caina: Traitors to Kindred( family)

Antenora: Traitors to country and party.

Punishment/Contrapasso:

In Caina, sinners were buried in frozen lake with only their upper body on the top. In Antenora, sinner were buried in frozen lake with only their heads on the top. Generally, the punishment makes those sinners confined in a shape and cannot move, which makes them unable to betray people or country no more because they are physically unable to do so. Specifically, in Caina, the two brothers, Napoleone and Alessandro were tangled with each other. They committed the sin of trying to get inheritance from their father. Before they were killed, they were enemies and angry at each other. Here, they were forced to face each other and bonded with each other. How ironic is that!

Characters:

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Brothers Napolenoe and Alessandro	Son of Count Alberto of Mangona. They tried to seek inheritance from their father and ended up killing each other,
Sassol Mascheroni:	A member of the Florentine family of the Toschi; he murdered his uncle's only son for the sake of an inheritance, which fell to Sassol when the uncle died shortly thereafter.
Camiscion de' Pazzi	Camiscion de' Pazzi: Alberto or Umberto Camiscion, one of the Pazzi of the Valdarno; he is said to have killed his kinsman Ubertino for his castles.
Buoso da Duera of Cremona	Buoso da Duera of Cremona: During the campaign of Charles of Anjou against Manred, Buoso used French gold to bribe the Archese Pallavicino and the Lombard Ghibellines to allow the passage of the French troops toward Pama.
Tesauro di Beccheria of Pavia	abbot of Vallombrosa and papal legate in Florence for Pope Alexander IV. After the Ghibellines were expelled in July 1258, he was seized by the Florentines on charges of conspiring with the exiles.
Gianni de' Soldanier	After the defeat of Manfred in 1266, the Florentine Gianni de' Soldanieri became a Guelf in order to secure power.
Ganelon	With Judas, the archetypal medieval traitor. Ganelon was bribed by the Saracen king Marsilio to betray his stepson and the whole rear guard of Charlemagne's army, causing the massacre of Roncesvalles.
Tebaldello:	A member of the Ghibelline Zambrasi family of Faenza; he avenged a private grudge against the Lambertazzi, a Bolognese family that had taken refuge there after their expulsion from Bologna in 1274. On the morning of November 13,1280, Tebaldello opened the gates of Faenza to the Bolognese Guelfs, who entered the city and massacred their enemies.

Discussion Qs:

1. What is contrapasso about the voices made by sinners in frozen lake?

2. Why Bocca did not want to reveal his identity?

3. What is ironic about the name "Bocca"?