Inferno XXXIII Circle Nine (The Treacherous)

In this Canto Dante comes across count Ugolino and Archbishop Ruggieri damned for treason. “In life they had once plotted together, Then Ruggieri betrayed his fellow plotter and caused his death, by starvation, along with his four sons”(Ciardi 270). This canto describes the betrayal of Count Ugolino who was told he would be given absolution for his sins before he committed them. Dante and Virgil also meet Friar Alberigo who Dante still knows to be alive. The Friar tells him he is not dead, “how my body fares in the upper world I do not know” (Sayers 33.122-123).