Soothsayers

The Soothsayers in canto XX sound like fortune tellers. So I'm gonna base this entry off that assumption.

Fortune telling or looking into the future has been nothing new for humanity. For almost all humankind history, guessing what will occur has been a fascinating topic. Until the Dark Ages. During this time, I guess there wasn't any lightbulbs. LOL. Also there was a much too much influence by the Catholic Church. The Catholic Church had virtually slowed down humanities ascent towards enlightenment. For a millennium they've prevented us from doing anything to help us.

As we can see from Dante, almost everything can be punished in hell. No risks were taken.

How did Dante begin the Enlightenment?

Jason and the Argo-NOTS

Jason, the mythical hero of Greek folklore is mention in this chapter, along with some infamous pimps of Dante's time. Chapter XVIII is a fine example reinforce two previous thesis I had brought up. Venedico Caccianemico and Alessio Interminei were both alive during Dante's time. Venedico was supposedly an Italian man who sold his sister to Maruis of Este to gain favors. This is just an assumuntion made by Dante and no real truth has been found about it. Also Alessio Interminei doesn't have any major history were he is spoken about. I'm just assuming Dante hated this guy. Like how many people during Dante's time was a pimp?!

Jason though, he was a hero to many Greeks. He was looked upon as Hercules was once. How come the Catholic's views differ from the Greeks? Hmm..

the Demons and the Pitchforks

The Demons had threatened Dante and Virgil with their PITCHFORKS! In our modern world, we connect devils/demons with pitchfork. So that makes me wonder how much did Dante influnence our world. Was he the one that made us think of hell as a place of fire (or boiling blood)? Was he the one that decided that demons carried pitchforks?

The Popes

I'm not sure if I completely understand the contrapasso for deceitful Popes. They are shoved into a well with their feet on fire. It just sounds like Dante might have hated Pope Boniface and thought that would be the ultimate torture for him. Maybe a good thesis topic would be to research the relationship between Dante, the Church and the overall religion.

Chiron

Again in Canto XII, more Greek mythological creatures are presented. And one of them, Chiron, is considered one of the most famous. Chiron was a centaur, half human, half horse, and in Greek mythology, he is the wise and helpful. But in Inferno, he's presented as part of hell, making life harder for them. Again this backs up my previous thesis, maybe it might be useful.

Some mildly interesting Canto's describing hell

Were mildly interesting...until Canto XII. The Minotaur! The Minotaur was a Greek "evil" beast that was fed Athenian sacrifices. In Inferno, he's the one guarding the wrathful souls. This makes me think, is this some how connected with the Greek myth? Are the souls some how telling us a message about the Athenians? In the views of the Christians, Athenians were the perfect example of souls that belonged in hell. They practice fortune telling, sodomy and many other "sins". As well as the names of people he was assumed to dislike, is the Inferno really just a way for Dante to insult his enemies?

So thesis time; "Dante uses the Inferno the criticize many figures he knew and throughout history."

Oh God.

The first part of hell, Vestibule seems kind of scary. As Vestibule is for the indecisive, it sorta connects to isolationism, not taking sides. As my intended major is going to be history, it automatically made me of America's early beginnings as an isolationist country. And through that, I came up with a so-so thesis that needs some refining.

"If Inferno was translated into modern and semi-modern terms, who would be the modern people that replace old ones" aka the Dalai Lama replaces Virgil and many American presidents would replaces the angels.