Canto XVI
CANTO XVI
Dante recognizes the poverty of noble birth when unaccompanied by a noble character, yet he cannot help glorying in his own ancestor and addresses him in Italian with the honorific plural. Not unaware of the Pilgrim’s small lapse into pride, Beatrice nevertheless smiles at him indulgently. Rejoicing in a greatness that transcends him, the Poet asks his great-great-grandfather to speak of his family, the former days in Florence, the previous size of the city, and the character of those who ruled it (1–27). Like embers stoked by the wind, Cacciaguida glows more brightly at Dante’s reverent words and, in the more refined dialect of an earlier time, modestly replies that his family came from within the ancient city walls near the Porta San Piero and that he himself was born in 1091 (28–45). He puts the number of those fit to bear arms in his day at a fifth of the total population of present-day Florence (46–48) and describes its citizens as being of pure blood before mixing with the rustic folk from neighboring towns, which causes him to deplore the degeneration and immoderate size occasioned by its foreign elements. But no city endures eternally, and Fortune causes Florence to change as constantly as the tides of the ocean (49–84). Having reviewed the former leading families of the city, all of which have now either declined or disappeared, Cacciaguida concludes with a lament for the subsequent strife of Guelphs and Ghibellines, and later of Black Guelphs and White, which mars the peace, the justice, and the glory of the city’s former days (85–154).
1 O scant nobility of blood! Although
You make us glory here below in you,
Where all of our affections languish so,
4 It will not make me wonder for, it’s true,
Where human appetite in no way veers,
In Heaven’s reign, I gloried in you, too.
7 What shrinkage in your mantle soon appears!
If day by day we don’t increase it, how
Swift time goes round about it with its shears!
10 Then, with that voi which Rome would first allow,
In which her families least persevere,
I started speaking once again; and now,[394]
13 Aside, did smiling Beatrice appear
As though she were another, also nigh,
Who coughed at that first fault of Guinevere:[395]
16 “You are my father,” started my reply;
“You made me fully bold to speak when first
You raised me so that I am more than I.
19 My mind, which many rivers have submersed
In gladness, finds within itself great glee
That it can bear so much and still not burst.
22 But tell me now, who was your family,
Dear origin? What were the years long gone
Recorded in your days of infancy?
25 And tell me of the sheepfold of St. John;[396]
How large was it back then? Who were the folk
Most fit to hold high seats?” And thereupon,
28 As, quickening, the breath of winds will stoke
The coals to flames, I witnessed in such wise
That light grow brighter at kind words I spoke.
31 As it became more comely to my eyes,
It said in gentler tones, more sweetly bred,
Though still not in a speech of modern guise:
34 “Down from the day when ‘Ave’ first was said[397]
To when my mother, blessèd now, who bore
Me in her womb, gave birth to me abed,
37 Five hundred fifty times and thirty more
This fire had come to re-ignite its flame
Beneath the Lion’s paw. And, furthermore,[398]
40 My ancestors and I as well all came
From that locale where those who run first touch
The farthest ward down in your yearly game.[399]
43 But of my forebears let suffice this much;
For who they were, from where they all derive—
It’s better to keep still than talk of such.
46 All those who at that time were fit to strive
At arms between Mars and the Baptist ran[400]
To but a fifth of those right now alive.
49 Its citizens, now mixed with Campi’s clan,
And by Certaldo’s and Fegghine’s drowned,[401]
Were pure down to the humblest working man.
52 How much the better if those named were found
As neighbors and your borders at the brink
Of Trespiano’s and Galluzzo’s bound[402]
55 Than having them within to bear the stink
Of Aguglione’s churl and of that one
From Signa, with his jobber’s sharp-eyed wink![403]
58 If those who in the world are most undone
Had not been Caesar’s stepdame but instead[404]
Had been a mother gracious to her son,
61 Then one, made Florentine, would soon be sped[405]
To truck and trade right back to Simifonti,
Where once his father’s father begged his bread.
64 And Montemurlo would still have its Conti,[406]
Acone’s parish hold the Cerchi still,
And Valdigreve too its Buondelmonti.[407]
67 A mingled people always leads to ill
Within the life of cities that would thrive
As you turn sick from eating past your fill.
70 A bull gone blind more quickly takes a dive
Than would a blinded lamb; one sword will hew
Yet more and better, often, than do five.
73 See Luni, and see Urbisaglia, two
Already gone; behind them disappear
Both Sinigaglia and Chiusi too.[408]
76 It thus should not seem strange or hard to hear
Some family died out for every sort
Of city also has its term, I fear.
79 And all of your affairs, like you, comport
Their deaths within, though death does not appear
In things long-lasting since your lives are short.
82 And as the turning of the lunar sphere
Without repose unveils and veils the shore,[409]
So Fortune does with Florence year by year.
85 Hence, there should be no wonder at the lore
I tell of Florentines both great and fine,
Whose fame is hid by time for evermore.
88 I saw the Ughi, Catelini’s line,[410]
Ormanni’s, Alberichi’s, Greci’s men,
Filippi’s too, once famous, in decline.
91 As great as they were old, I saw back then
Ardinghi’s, L’Arca’s, La Sannella’s fate,
Bostichi’s too, and Soldanieri’s when,
94 Quite near the gate now laden with the weight[411]
Of a new felony of such great blame
That soon the bark will jettison its freight,[412]
97 There lived the Ravignani, from whom came
Count Guido and whoever in his train
Has taken on great Bellincione’s name. [413]
100 Then Della Pressa well knew how to reign,[414]
And Galligaio had a household where
The gilded hilt and pommel still had lain.[415]
103 Great were the Giuochi, and the strip of vair,
Sacchetti, Gall’, Fifanti, and Barucci,
And those still blushing at the stave affair.[416]
106 That stock was great which fathered the Calfucci,
And raised already to the curule seats[417]
Were both the Sizii and Arrigucci.
109 How great were those undone by proud conceits[418]
As I have seen; and once the balls of gold[419]
Had flowered Florence in her greatest feats.
112 Such were the fathers of the overbold,
Who, when the Church is vacant, aren’t averse
To fatt’ning in consistories they hold.[420]
115 That haughty breed (which dragonlike would curse[421]
The one who flees but like a lamb has been
To him who shows his teeth—or else his purse)
118 Now on the rise, though of low origin,
Met not with Ubertín’ Donati’s grace
When his wife’s father made him of their kin.
121 The Caponsacchi came to market-place
Down from Fiésole; good townsmen too
Were Guida’s, also Infangato’s race.[422]
124 I’ll tell a thing incredible but true:
One entered that small circuit by a gate
That bore the name of Della Pera’s crew![423]
127 All those who bear the ensign of the great
And mighty Baron Hugh, whose name and worth[424]
The day of Thomas has kept fresh to date,
130 He knighted and gave privilege of birth;
Though he who fringed his shield does not forebear
To side with common people of the earth.[425]
133 The Gualterotti were already where
The Importuni lived; the Borgo’s ears
Would have more rest if spared new neighbors there.[426]
136 The house from which is born your store of tears
Because of just disdain which slaughtered you
And put an end to all your happy years[427]
139 Was honored as were its companions too;
O Buondelmonte, woe to you who fly
Your nuptials, prompted by another’s cue!
142 So many would be glad who sadly cry
Had God thrown you to Ema’s streams and barred[428]
You from the city when you first came nigh.
145 How fit that Florence, her last peace now marred,
Should bring a victim to the broken stone
That on the Ponte Vecchïo keeps guard.[429]
148 With all these folk and others like their own
I then saw Florence in such rest immersed
She hadn’t any cause to weep or moan.
151 And with such ones I saw her people versed
In justice and to such a glory led
That on its staff no lily was reversed,
154 Nor by division dyed vermilion red.”[430]