# Dis (Divine Comedy)

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City in Dante's Inferno

Dis Divine Comedy location Lower Hell, inside the walls of Dis, in an illustration by Stradanus. There is a drop from the sixth circle to the three rings of the seventh circle, then again to the ten rings of the eighth circle, and, at the bottom, to the icy ninth circle. Created by Dante Alighieri

In [Dante Alighieri](/source/Dante_Alighieri)'s *[The Divine Comedy](/source/Divine_Comedy)*, the **City of Dis** ([Italian](/source/Italian_language): *Dite* Italian pronunciation: [\[ˈdiːte\]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Help:IPA/Italian)) encompasses the sixth through the ninth circles of [Hell](/source/Hell).[1]

Moated by the river [Styx](/source/Styx), the fortified city encloses the whole of Lower or Nether Hell.[2]

## Background

To [ancient Roman mythology](/source/Roman_mythology), [Dis Pater](/source/Dis_Pater) ("Father Dis") is the ruler of the underworld.[3] In the sixth book of [Virgil](/source/Virgil)'s *[Aeneid](/source/Aeneid)* (one of the principal influences on Dante in his depiction of Hell), the hero [Aeneas](/source/Aeneas) enters the "desolate halls and vacant realm of Dis".[4]

His guide, the [Sibyl](/source/Sibyl), corresponds in *The Divine Comedy* to Virgil, the guide of "Dante" as the speaker of the poem. The descriptions in the *Aeneid* of "mighty Dis's walls... wide buildings girt by a triple wall",[5] gave Dante the impetus for his later and more formal description of the city of Dis.[6]

## Description

The iron walls of Dis are guarded by [fallen angels](/source/Fallen_angel), the [Furies](/source/Erinyes), and [Medusa](/source/Medusa).[7] Dante emphasizes the character of the place as a city by describing its architectural features: towers, gates, walls, ramparts, bridges, and moats. It is thus an antithesis to the heavenly city, as for instance described by [St. Augustine](/source/St._Augustine) in his book *[City of God](/source/City_of_God_(book))*.[8] Among these structures are [mosques](/source/Mosque),[9] "the worship places of the most dangerous enemies of medieval [Christendom](/source/Christendom)."[10] The presence of mosques probably also recalls the reality of [Jerusalem](/source/Jerusalem) in Dante's own time, where gilded domes dominated the skyline.[11]

## Tiers of Hell

Before he reaches the City, in the eighth to ninth cantos, Dante encounters the unbaptised and then those who sinned by self-indulgence—the lustful, the gluttons, the misers and spendthrifts—and then at the outskirts of the red-hot walls of the City of Dis are the wrathful and those of ill-will.[12] From this point on we find sinners who acted out of malice and wickedness. Immediately within the walls of the City are [Heretics](/source/Heresy) like [Epicurus](/source/Epicurus), who, having previously disbelieved in immortality, are forever imprisoned in red-hot tombs.[13] Beyond are three rings of those who were violent—to others, to themselves (suicides), or to God (blasphemers).[14] In yet deeper gulfs within the decaying City of Dis are the last two circles, of frauds and corruptors, and finally the traitors.

Punished within Dis are those whose lives were marked by active-willed and [obdurate](https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/obdurate), rather than [venial](https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/venial) sins:[15] [heretics](/source/Heresy), [murderers](/source/Murder), [suicides](/source/Suicide), [blasphemers](/source/Blasphemy), [usurers](/source/Usury), [sodomites](/source/Sodomy), panderers, seducers, flatterers, [simoniacs](/source/Simony), [false prophets](/source/False_prophet), [barrators](/source/List_of_cultural_references_in_Divine_Comedy#barratry), [hypocrites](/source/Hypocrisy), [thieves](/source/Theft), fraudulent advisors, sowers of discord, falsifiers, and [traitors](/source/Betrayal). Sinners unable to control their passions offend God less than these, whose lives were driven by *malizia* ("malice, wicked intent"):

Of every malice *(malizia)* gaining the hatred of [Heaven](/source/Heaven), injustice is the goal; and every such goal injures someone either with force or fraud.[16]

There is perhaps a distinction between *malizia* as the characteristic of circles seven and eight, and the *matta bestialitade*, "inhuman wickedness", of circle nine, which punishes those who threaten "the most basic civic, familial, and religious foundations of happiness".[17]

## Later manifestations

The City of Dis re-emerges as an image for the post-industrial city of [modernity](/source/Modernity),[18] as in [Pasolini](/source/Pasolini)'s vision of some aspects of modern [Rome](/source/Rome).[19]

## See also

- [Pandæmonium](/source/Pand%C3%A6monium_(Paradise_Lost))

- [Pluto](/source/Pluto_(mythology))

## References

1. **[^](#cite_ref-1)** *Inferno* 9.106 to 34.81. Citations from *The Divine Comedy*, unless otherwise noted, are those of H. Wayne Storey, entry on "Dis", in *The Dante Encyclopedia* (Routledge, 2010), pp. 306–307.

1. **[^](#cite_ref-2)** Dante *Hell* (Penguin 1975) p. 318

1. **[^](#cite_ref-3)** H Nettleship ed., *A Dictionary of Classical Antiquities* (London 1895)p. 195

1. **[^](#cite_ref-4)** *Domos Ditis uacuas et inania regna* (*Aeneid* 6.269).

1. **[^](#cite_ref-5)** Virgil, *The Aeneid* (Penguin 1990) pp. 178–9

1. **[^](#cite_ref-6)** R. Lansing, *The Dante Encyclopedia* (2010) p. 306

1. **[^](#cite_ref-7)** Dante *Hell* (Penguin 1975) p. 118 and 124

1. **[^](#cite_ref-8)** Storey, *The Dante Encyclopedia*, p. 306.

1. **[^](#cite_ref-9)** Dante, *Inferno*, 8.70 "*meschite*"; Ciardi's annotation to this verse: "To a European of Dante's time a mosque would seem the perversion of a church, the impious counterpart of the House of God, just as Satan is God's impious counterpart. His city is therefore architecturally appropriate, a symbolism that becomes all the more terrible when the mosques are made of red-hot iron." John Ciardi, trans., The Inferno (1954, NY, Mentor Classic) page 85.

1. **[^](#cite_ref-10)** Peter Bondanella, *The Inferno: Dante Alighieri*, note to the translation of [Henry Wadsworth Longfellow](/source/Henry_Wadsworth_Longfellow) (Fine Creative Media, 2003), pp. 206–207.

1. **[^](#cite_ref-11)** Anthony K. Cassell, "The Tomb, the Tower and the Pit: Dante's Satan," in *Dante: Dante and Interpretation* (Routledge, 2003), p. 204.

1. **[^](#cite_ref-12)** Dante *Hell* (Penguin 1975) pp. 311-314

1. **[^](#cite_ref-13)** Dante *Hell* (Penguin 1975) p. 128

1. **[^](#cite_ref-14)** Dante *Hell* (Penguin 1975) p. 134-5

1. **[^](#cite_ref-15)** Dante *Hell* (Penguin 1975) p. 120 and p. 139

1. **[^](#cite_ref-16)** 11.22–24, as cited by Storey, *The Dante Encyclopedia*, p. 307.

1. **[^](#cite_ref-17)** Storey, *The Dante Encyclopedia*, p. 307.

1. **[^](#cite_ref-18)** P Mitchell, *Cartographic Strategies of Postmodernity* (2013) p. 111

1. **[^](#cite_ref-19)** P. P. Pasolini, *Stories from the City of God* (2019) p. 196

## External links

- [*What kind of city is Hell?*](https://web.archive.org/web/20210928104153/http://www.thetowner.com/what-kind-of-city-is-hell/), archived from [the original](http://www.thetowner.com/what-kind-of-city-is-hell/) on 2021-09-28, retrieved 2023-08-15

v t e Dante Alighieri Works in Latin De vulgari eloquentia De Monarchia Eclogues Epistle to Cangrande (disputed) Works in Italian La Vita Nuova Le Rime Convivio Divine Comedy Inferno Purgatorio Paradiso Cultural references Books, articles, concepts Contrapasso Dante Encyclopedia Enciclopedia Dantesca People in Dante's life Alighiero di Bellincione (father) Jacopo Alighieri (son) Guido Cavalcanti Forese Donati Brunetto Latini Beatrice Portinari Papal commentaries Cando lucis aeternae Dante in popular culture Dante crater Dante asteroid 83 Beatrix Dante Alighieri Academy Scuola Italiana Dante Alighieri Dante Park, New York Dante Park, Montreal Monument to Dante The Barque of Dante (1822 painting) Dante in Hell (1835 painting) Francesca da Rimini and Paolo Malatesta Appraised by Dante and Virgil (1835 painting) Dante and Virgil (1850 painting) The Barque of Dante (1858 painting) Dante's Dream (1871 painting) Dante and Beatrice (1883 painting) Beatrice (1919 film) Dante Alighieri (1921 sculpture) Dante Symphony Italian battleship Dante Alighieri Devil May Cry Dante's Inferno (video game) Related Tomb of Dante Dante Society of America

v t e Dante's Divine Comedy Characters and locations Inferno Acheron Bertran de Born Bonturo Dati Brunetto Latini Caiaphas Cavalcante de' Cavalcanti Capaneus Cerberus Charon Chiron Ciacco Ciampolo Cocytus Dis Farinata degli Uberti Filippo Argenti Francesca da Rimini Geryon Gianni Schicchi de' Cavalcanti Great refusal Gualdrada Berti Guido Guerra of Dovadola Guido I da Montefeltro Iacopo Rusticucci Malebolge Minos Nessus Paolo Malatesta Phlegethon Phlegyas Pietro della Vigna Plutus Pope Boniface VIII Pope Nicholas III Ruggieri degli Ubaldini Satan Styx Ugolino della Gherardesca Ulysses Vanni Fucci Virgil Circles of Hell First Second Third Fourth Fifth Sixth Seventh Eighth Ninth Malebranche Alichino Barbariccia Cagnazzo Calcabrina Ciriatto Draghignazzo Farfarello Malacoda Rubicante Scarmiglione Purgatorio Alagia Fieschi Arnaut Daniel Beatrice Portinari Beatrice d'Este Belacqua Bonagiunta Orbicciani Bonconte da Montefeltro Casella Cato the Younger Conrad Malaspina Eunoe Forese Donati Gaia da Camino Garden of Eden Gherardo III da Camino Giovanna da Montefeltro Guido Guinizelli Hugh Capet Jacopo del Cassero Giovanna Visconti Lethe Manfred Marco Lombardo Matelda Nella Donati Nino Visconti Oderisi da Gubbio Omberto Aldobrandeschi Pia de' Tolomei Pope Adrian V Sapia Salvani Sordello Statius Paradiso Adam Bernard of Clairvaux Bonaventure Cacciaguida Charles Martel of Anjou Constance I of Sicily Constance II of Sicily Cunizza da Romano David Empyrean Folquet de Marselha Gabriel God Hierarchy of angels Imperial Eagle James the Great Jesus John the Apostle Justinian I Mary, mother of Jesus Peter Damian Peter Lombard Piccarda Ripheus Solomon Saint Peter Thomas Aquinas Trajan Concepts Contrapasso Terza rima Great refusal Verses "Pape Satàn, pape Satàn aleppe" "Raphèl mai amècche zabì almi" Adaptations Architecture Palacio Barolo (Palanti, 1923) Danteum (Terragni, 1938) Cinema L'Inferno (1911) Dante's Inferno (1924) Dante's Inferno (1935) The Dante Quartet (1987) A TV Dante (1989) The Deep and Dreamless Sleep (2006) Dante's Inferno (2007) Dante's Inferno: An Animated Epic (2010) La commedia di Amos Poe (2010) Dante's Hell Animated (2013) Botticelli Inferno (2016 documentary) Comics Demon Lord Dante (1971) Jimbo's Inferno (2006) Dante's Inferno (2023) Gert's Inferno (2023) Illustrations Divine Comedy Illustrated by Botticelli (1485) Jean Giraud (Paradiso, 1999) Literature The Story of Rimini (1816) La Comédie humaine (1830–1850) Earth Inferno (1905) The Cantos (1917–1962) As I Was Going Down Sackville Street (1937) The System of Dante's Hell (1965) Inferno (1976) The Dante Club (2003) Inferno (2013) Music (classical) Après une Lecture de Dante: Fantasia quasi Sonata (Liszt, 1849) Dante Symphony (Liszt, 1857) Francesca da Rimini (Tchaikovsky, 1876) Francesca da Rimini (Rachmaninoff, 1904) Francesca da Rimini (Zandonai, 1914) Gianni Schicchi (Puccini, 1918) The Divine Comedy (Smith, 1996) Inferno (Ronchetti, 2020) Music (modern) Inferno (1973 album) "Dante's Inferno" (1995 song) Dante XXI (2006 album) A Place Where the Sun Is Silent (2011 album) Paintings The Barque of Dante (Delacroix, 1822) The Wood of the Self-Murderers: The Harpies and the Suicides (Blake, 1827) Francesca da Rimini and Paolo Malatesta Appraised by Dante and Virgil (Scheffer, 1835) Dante in Hell (Flandrin, 1835) The Barque of Dante (Manet, 1850s) Dante and Virgil in the Ninth Circle of Hell (Doré, 1861) Pia de' Tolomei (Rossetti, 1868) Paolo and Francesca da Rimini (Rossetti, 1885) La barca de Aqueronte (Hidalgo, 1887) La Laguna Estigia (Hidalgo, 1887) Sculptures The Gates of Hell (Rodin, 1917) The Kiss (1882) The Thinker (1904) Video games King of Demons (1996) Devil May Cry series (2001) Bayonetta series (2009) Dante's Inferno (2010) The Lost (cancelled) ULTRAKILL (2020) Related Cultural references English translations In popular culture Category

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Adapted from the Wikipedia article [Dis (Divine Comedy)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dis_(Divine_Comedy)) by Wikipedia contributors ([contributor history](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dis_(Divine_Comedy)?action=history)). Available under [Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/). Changes may have been made.