The Sowers of Discord — Canto XXVIII

Canto 28 of Inferno by Dante Alighieri

Who ever could, e'en with untrammelled words, Tell of the blood and of the wounds in full Which now I saw, by many times narrating? Each tongue would for a certainty fall short By reason of our speech and memory, That have small room to comprehend so much.

If were again assembled all the people Which formerly upon the fateful land Of Puglia were lamenting for their blood Shed by the Romans and the lingering war That of the rings made such illustrious spoils, As Livy has recorded, who errs not, With those who felt the agony of blows By making counterstand to Robert Guiscard, And all the rest, whose bones are gathered still At Ceperano, where a renegade Was each Apulian, and at Tagliacozzo, Where without weapons conquered the old Alard;—

And one should show his limb transpierced, another His severed, it were nothing to compare With the disgusting mode of the ninth Bolgia.