Seventh Level of Hell
Guarded
by the Minotaur, who snarls in fury, and encircled within the river
Phlegethon, filled with boiling blood, is the Seventh Level of Hell. The
violent, the assasins, the tyrants, and the war-mongers lament their
pitiless mischiefs in the river, while centaurs armed with bows and
arrows shoot those who try to escape their punishment. The stench here
is overpowering. This level is also home to the wood of the suicides-
stunted and gnarled trees with twisting branches and poisoned fruit. At
the time of final judgement, their bodies will hang from their
branches. In those branches the Harpies, foul birdlike creatures with
human faces, make their nests. Beyond the wood is scorching sand where
those who committed violence against God and nature are showered with
flakes of fire that rain down against their naked bodies. Blasphemers
and sodomites writhe in pain, their tongues more loosed to lamentation,
and out of their eyes gushes forth their woe. Usurers, who followed
neither nature nor art, also share company in the Seventh Level.