The Third Circle. Intemperance in Food
Gluttons
On my return to consciousness, which closed
before the kindred couple’s piteous case,
which utterly confounded me with grief,
new torments all around me I behold,
and new tormented ones, where’er I move,
where’er I turn, and wheresoe’er I gaze.
In the third circle am I, that of rain
eternal, cursèd, cold and burdensome;
its measure and quality are never new.
Coarse hail, and snow, and dirty-colored water
through the dark air are ever pouring down;
and foully smells the ground receiving them.
A wild beast, Cerberus, uncouth and cruel,
is barking with three throats, as would a dog,
over the people that are there submerged.
Red eyes he hath, a dark and greasy beard,
a belly big, and talons on his hands;
he claws the spirits, flays and quarters them.
The rainfall causes them to howl like dogs;
with one side they make shelter for the other;
oft do the poor profaners turn about.
When Cerberus, the mighty worm, perceived us,
his mouths he opened, showing us his fangs;
nor had he any limb that he kept still.
My Leader then stretched out his opened palms,
and took some earth, and with his fists well filled,
he threw it down into the greedy throats.
And like a dog that, barking, yearns for food,
and, when he comes to bite it, is appeased,
since only to devour it doth he strain
and fight; even such became those filthy faces
of demon Cerberus, who, thundering, stuns
the spirits so, that they would fain be deaf.
Over the shades the heavy rain beats down
we then were passing, as our feet we set
upon their unreal bodies which seem real.
They each and all were lying on the ground,
excepting one, which rose and sat upright,
when it perceived us pass in front of it.
“O thou that through this Hell art being led,”
it said to me, “recall me, if thou canst;
for thou, before I unmade was, wast made.”
And I to it: “The anguish thou art in
perchance withdraws thee from my memory so,
it doth not seem that thee I ever saw.
But tell me who thou art, that in so painful
a place art set, and to such punishment,
that none, though greater, so repulsive is.”
And he to me: “Thy town, which is so full
of envy that the bag o’erflows already,
owned me when I was in the peaceful life.
Ciacco, you townsmen used to call me then;
for my injurious fault of gluttony
I ’m broken, as thou seest, by the rain;
nor yet am I, sad soul, the only one,
for all these here are subject, for like fault,
unto like pain.” Thereat he spoke no more.
“Thy trouble, Ciacco,” I replied to him,
“so burdens me that it invites my tears;
but tell me, if thou canst, to what will come
the citizens of our divided town;
if any one therein is just; and tell…
