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Sordello leads Virgil (and Dante the pilgrim, whom Sordello has hardly noticed) on to the beautiful dale on the lower slopes of Mount Purgatory.

This passage is one of the first where the poet has to write about beauty. And in doing so, he has to renegotiate his position toward Virgil's great poem, THE AENEID.

Join me, Mark Scarbrough, as we look at the steps up to the ridge that overlooks what will become the beautiful valley of the kings.

Here are the segments for this episode of WALKING WITH DANTE:

[01:13] My English translation of this passage: PURGATORIO, Canto VII, lines 64 - 81. If you'd like to read along, print it off, or drop a comment, please scroll down this page.

[03:37] With minimal effort, Sordello, Virgil, and Dante the pilgrim come to what seems to be the Elysian Fields of THE AENEID's afterlife.

[07:23] Dante's poetry may not yet be astute enough to handle beauty, rather than terror.

[13:05] If this spot in PURGATORIO is indeed an allusion to the Elysian Fields, then what of Limbo back in INFERNO?

[18:42] Rereading all of PURGATORIO, Canto VII, through this moment: lines 1 - 81.

And here’s my English translation of Purgatorio, Canto VII, Lines 64 – 81

We walked on a little ways from there.

That’s when I saw the mountain was carved out,

Just as the valleys carve out the mountains around here.

The shade [of Sordello] said, “We’ll head over there,

Where the slope turns into a sort of lap.

There, we’ll wait for the new day.”

A sloping path, not quite level but not really steep,

Brought us to the flank of that valley

Where its outer edge was more than half cut off.

Gold and fine silver, cochineal and white lead;

Indigo gems bright and clear;

Even a new emerald the moment it’s cut—

If any of that were set in that valley, it would all be surpassed,

When it comes to the color, by the flowers and grasses

That grew in that spot, as less is surpassed by greater.

Nature had not only painted that spot

But had blended the sweet scents of a thousand fragrances

Into a single indistinguishable aroma that I had never experienced before.