Guide to the 9 Circles of Hell from The Divine Comedy

1 circle. Limbo

The first circle of Hell is Limbo, where the souls of those who did not commit unrighteous deeds, but died without baptism, reside. They are doomed to painless grief. Unbaptized babies of ancient philosophers and poets (Virgil) live in Limbo, Noah, Moses and Abraham were also here - all the righteous men mentioned in the Old Testament - but then they were allowed to ascend to Paradise.

Guardian: Charon.
Punishment: sorrow without pain.

2 circle. Sweetness, lust

At the entrance, travelers are met by King Minos (a fair judge and father of the Minotaur), who distributes the souls in circles. Here everything is covered with darkness and a storm is constantly raging - gusts of wind throw the souls of those who were pushed onto the path of sin by love. He desired someone else's wife or husband, lived in debauchery - your soul will rush restless over the abyss forever.

Guardian: Minos.
Punishment: twisting and tormenting by a hurricane, hitting souls on the rocks of the underworld

3 circle. Gluttony

Gluttons are imprisoned in this circle: freezing rain always pours here, souls get stuck in a dirty slurry, and the demon Cerberus gnaws at the prisoners who have fallen under the clawed paw.

Guardian: Cerberus.
Punishment: rotting in the rain and hail

4 circle. Greed

The abode of those who "unworthily spent and saved", a gigantic plain on which two crowds stand. Their souls drag huge weights from place to place, and when they collide with each other, they enter into a fierce battle.

Guardian: Plutus.
Punishment: eternal dispute.

5 circle. Anger and boredom (despondency, laziness)

An eternal fight in the dirty swamp of Styx, where the bodies of the bored serve as the bottom. All circles up to the 5th are the haven of the unrestrained, and unrestraint is considered a lesser sin than "malice or violent bestiality", and therefore the suffering of souls there is eased compared to those who live on distant circles.

Guardian: Phlegius.
Punishment: an eternal fight up to the throat in a swamp.

6 circle. For heretics and false teachers

The flaming city of Dit (the Romans called Dit Hades, the god of the underworld), which is guarded by the sisters of the Furies with tangles of snakes instead of hair. Inescapable sorrow reigns here, and heretics and false teachers rest in the open tombs, as if in eternal furnaces. The tombstone is open, a fire burns inside the grave - it heats the walls of the tomb to redness. The transition to the 7th circle is protected by a fetid abyss.

Guardians: Furies.
Punishment: be a ghost in a fiery grave.

7 circle. For rapists and murderers of all stripes

This circle is divided into three zones.

In the first - rapists over the neighbor and over his property (tyrants and robbers), they are destined to boil in a moat of red-hot blood.

In the second - rapists over themselves (suicides) and over their property (gamblers and wasters, that is, senseless destroyers of their property). Suicides in the form of trees are tormented by harpies, motes are driven by hounds.

In the third - rapists over the deity (blasphemers), over nature (sodomites) and art (reckless). They are destined to languish in a barren desert where fiery rain drips from the sky.

Guardian: Minotaur.

8 circle. For those who deceived the untrustworthy

The haven of pimps and seducers consists of 10 ditches (Slobozukha, Evil Slits), in the center of which lies the most terrible - the 9th - circle of Hell. Soothsayers, soothsayers, sorceresses, bribe takers, hypocrites, flatterers, thieves, alchemists, false witnesses and counterfeiters are tormented nearby. The same circle includes priests who traded in church positions.

Guardian: Geryon.
Punishment: sinners walk in two oncoming streams, scourged by demons, stuck in foul-smelling feces, some bodies are chained in rocks, fire flows down their feet. Someone boils in tar, and if he sticks his head out, the devils pierce the gaffs. Those chained in lead robes are placed on a red-hot brazier, sinners are gutted and tormented by reptiles, leprosy and lichen.

9 circle. Deceived those who trusted

In the very center of the Underworld is the icy lake Cocytus. Like Viking hell, it's incredibly cold here. Here lie the apostates frozen into the ice, and the main one is Lucifer, the fallen angel. Judas Iscariot (who betrayed Christ), Brutus (who betrayed the trust of Julius Caesar) and Cassius (also a participant in the conspiracy against Caesar) are tormented in the three jaws of Lucifer.

The same fate awaits traitors to relatives, traitors to the motherland and like-minded people, traitors to guests, friends and companions, traitors to benefactors, the majesty of God and man.

Guardians: the giants Briareus, Ephialtes, Antaeus.
Punishment: eternal torment in an icy lake.