By Manlio Marano

Dante had fainted after the story of Paolo and Francesca. Then he awakens in the Third Circle, where he sees souls tormented by dark and malodorous rain. The guardian of the Third Circle, where the Gluttons are punished, is the horrifying three-headed dog Cerberus, described with demonic features. He torments the damned souls with his claws and menaces Dante by showing him his fangs. Once again, Virgil intervenes and calms down the horrifying infernal guardian by throwing in his three mouths the same putrid sludge in which the damned souls lie.
Now Dante can pass, but a shade suddenly sits up to speak with him. He is Ciacco, a citizen of Florence, known for his constant presence at banquets of every kind. Now, if in the previous canto the topic was love, in his passionate and ethical aspects, the VI canto is the first political canto of the Divine Comedy. Dante presents the corruption and the moral decadence hitting the City of Florence. So Dante asks Ciacco about the destiny of his hometown, and he foretells the expulsion of the Black Guelphs by the White ones, and the falling of the White Guelphs themselves, caused by the intromission of a mysterious figure. Dante makes us understand that this person is the hated Boniface VIII. Then Ciacco goes on to say that the discords between the citizens of Florence are due to the vices of pride, envy and avarice. So Dante asks about some illustrious citizens of Florence, among which the great Farinata, to know where they have ended up. Ciacco tells him that they are all condemned in Hell. Eventually, the glutton from Florence prays Dante to remember his name when he will be back among the living beings. At the end of the dialogue, Ciacco turns his eyes and fall unconscious into the muck where the other souls are lying. So Virgil explains to Dante that that damned will not awaken until the Last Judgment. In the meanwhile, the two poets arrive to the following Circle, where they find Pluto, another infernal guardian.

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