Heftel, Christian (Utah Valley University
Faculty Advisor: Abbott, Scott (Humanities and Social Sciences, Integrated Studies)
The cosmos of Dante Alighieri is one obsessed with verticality. Hell is a hole in the ground, Purgatory a pillar that rises to the heavens. The deeper one descends into Hell, the worse the sinners one encounters. The higher one soars into Paradise, the more blessed the saints, until one finally arrives at the pinnacle of the Great Chain of Being: God. This accords with the common orientational metaphors identified by Lakoff and Johnson, where up is associated with good, with power, and with authority; and down is associated with depravity, impotence, and subjugation.
However, it is not merely Dante's cosmology that is concerned with the vertical. In his treatment of individual humans and their qualities and deeds, Dante similarly expresses an interest in their height, their posture, and their ability to stand upright. This interest is shown vividly in three beings or classes in Inferno: the virtuous pagans of Limbo, the wind-tossed lustful, and the king of Hell himself: Satan. In the poem, the virtuous pagans stand, suggesting moral and intellectual uprightness. The lustful, although lifted high into the air by the storms that beat them, are still unable to stand because they lack ground beneath their feet. Finally, Satan appears to stand, but is actually later shown to be imprisoned and inverted, frozen halfway through a fall from Heaven. Examining these three cases gives insight into Dante's conception of reason, sin, virtue, and the universe itself--and it gives similar insight into the linguistic and metaphorical connotations of human bipedality.