DANTE'S SUBLIME COMEDY: PARADISE: Chapter 16

CHAPTER 16: Old Families

How daft you are, great pride in noble birth!

            On earth I knew proud men deformed by you

            and here in Paradise you ruled my mood.        3

Since evil could not influence my soul

            I freely gloried in my noble birth.

            That Cacciaguida died on a Crusade                6

as many others did is widely known.

            How wonderful to find my ancestor

            had once been knighted by the Emperor!         9

Pride is a splendid robe. Alas, it shrinks

            as time goes round us with it’s snipping shears

            cutting off hems, while pride makes us sew on 12

new widths of extra cloth. I spoke again

addressing him as Sire, once common speech

            but now a title fallen out of date.                       15

My lady stood apart, but near, and smiled

reminding me of something I had read.    

When Lancelot was courting Guinevere           18

           

a waiting woman who was standing near,

            hearing what hinted at adultery,

gave a wee warning cough. My lady’s smile     21

suggested that ahem, but still I spoke.

            “Dear Sire, you are my great progenitor!

            Sire, you embolden me to speak my mind,         24

for Sire, you lift me up so high I feel

            much more than me! So many happy streams

            flow down into my mind, I do not know           27

how I can entertain them and not drown!

            So please dear Sire and source of all my blood,

            when were you born? Who were your ancestors? 30

What people flourished in your days of youth?

            I know that pagan Florence worshipped Mars,

            then took the Baptist John as Patron Saint          33

and shepherd too. How many were his flock?

            Which families were worthy of respect?”

            As puff of breath makes red-hot coal flare up,    36

so did my Grandsire brighten at my prayer.

            His voice grew gentler, sweeter as he said,

            “From when the Virgin heard she was with child 39

to when my sainted mother gave me birth

Mars, moving round the starry zodiac,

had told eleven-hundred-eighty years.                  42

I and my forefathers were born between

the Ponte Vecchio and Baptistry.

Where they came from before I do not know,      45

When Florence was a fifth its present size

they carried weapons to defend the town

in time of war. I know their blood was pure         48

like all in Florence then, labourers too.

None had been tainted by their intercourse

with Campi, Certaldo and Figlive.                        51

If kept beyond our walls these hives of boors

would not have their offspring’s offsprings knocking

            hard at your doors, if not at home inside.              54

No stinking clowns out of Aguglion

            and Signa could be swindling or preside  

            over Florentine citizens today.                              57

           

The priesthood who, of all the men on earth

            should most uphold the laws that Caesar made

            that Europe might be unified in peace,                 60

undid the ties of right authority.

            They let some people become Florentine

            who live by lending, borrowing and pawns.        63

You have a banker who, were justice done,

            would be returned to Semifonté where

            his grandsire was a beggar in the streets.              66

Good Counts would still own Montemurio;

            the Cerchi, Acone; the Buondelmonti,

            Valdegreve. Admitting strangers begins               69

            

municipal decline, as too much food          

            destroys a body’s health. Blind bulls fall

            heavier than sightless lambs. A swordsman,         72

                              

neat and trim, can cut down five obese

            oponents. Think of Urbisaglia,

            of Luni too, cities that disappeared,                       75

and how Chiusi and Senigallia

            are following. People and cities die.

It is not strange great families fade too.                 78

Don’t think it marvellous if now I name

            great Florentines whose fame is dimmed by time.                                  

I saw the Ughi, Greci, Ormanni,                           81

the Filippi and Alberichi too:

            illustrious, though near extinction then.                                       

Others I saw, ancient but also great:                     84

del Arca, Sannella, Soldanieri,         

            Ardinghi and Bostichi, also the                                                       

Ravignani, famed now for perfidy                        87

soon to eclipse that line. Among them was

Count Guido, descended from the splendid                                 

Bellincion. Della Pressa by then                           90

knew how to rule. Galigaio wore

            a knight’s sword. So did Galli, Sacchetti

            and a few more who bore the Pigli arms.              93

So did the cheat who falsified the weights                                               

for salt he sold. The Calfucci forebears

had grown great, but I saw pride bring them low. 96

When three gold balls flourished over Florence

Sizii, Arrigucci were officers.

So were grandsires of those who, noticing           99

vacancies in the church, fill them, grow rich:

– mean men of base blood, dragons to the weak,

lambs to those showing teeth, or a full purse!       102

That crew was rising. The Caponsacco

                 from Fiesole was in our market-place.

                 Guida and Infangato had become                    105

  

respected citizens, Argenti too,

                 though Ubertino Donato was peeved

                 when his father-in-law made him their kin      108

by wedding his wife’s sister onto one.

                 I’ll tell you something strange. Those inner walls

                 the ancient Romans built were entered once   111

by a gate named after della Pera;

                 people forgotten now. Then everyone

                 who bore the arms of Tuscan Marquis Hugh  114

were Tory through and through, though today

                 one, Guiano della Bella, is a Whig

                 cheered by the mob. The Gualterotti and        117

Importuni still had not sunk so low

                 as to become the tradesmen that you know.

                 The Borgo district would have stayed at peace 120

had the Buondelmonte not arrived,

                 that family from which your tears have sprung

                 from just resentment of the death it brought,     123

ending your chances of a happy life.

                 O Buondelmonte, you were wrong to jilt

                 she you had sworn to wed, and take instead     126

a daughter of the Donati. Many

                 now sorrowful would have led happy lives

                 if you had drowned before you reached our town. 129

The family whose daughter you jilted

                 slaughtered you fittingly on Arno’s bridge

                 beside that wasted stone, statue of Mars,                132

thus starting endless Whig and Tory wars.

                 My tranquil days were passed before our strife

                 became continual, but then our flag                        135

(never taken in battle by a foe)

                 became two: Tory lillies on white ground;

                 Whig lillies upon red. This fatal split

led to more bloodshed, many thousands dead.”                       139