Acquacheta

Description

In Inferno XVI Dante uses the name Acquacheta within a long simile intended to evoke the roar of a very high and steep waterfall. The image is associated with that of the Montone river, the first watercourse that flows on the left slope of the Apennines starting from Monviso toward the east, different from the others because it does not flow into the Po. The name Acquacheta, the notes to the canto explain, designates the stream in its upper course, before it descends onto the plain; once it reaches the level of Forlì this name is lost, because the watercourse no longer keeps it. The notes identify the Acquacheta as the branch of the Montone that forms the waterfalls of San Benedetto, near the abbey of the same name situated on the Apennines and well known in Dante's time. The simile serves to measure the reverberation of Phlegethon, which plunges into the eighth circle dividing the sand from the next circle, thereby separating the episode of the three sodomites from the following scene.