Naples

Description

In Purgatorio Dante places Naples three hours of sun away from Jerusalem, according to his symbolic geography. The city is called to mind in relation to Virgil's remains: the body of the poet, who died at Brindisi in 19 B.C. on his way back from a journey to Greece, was transported and buried at Naples by Augustus. The Dantean verse echoes the epitaph attributed to Virgil, handed down by Donatus: Mantua me genuit, Calabri rapuere, tenet nunc Parthenope. The hour of vespers which, according to Dante's reckoning, falls upon Naples while the sun rises on the shore of Purgatory marks the distance between Virgil's earthly life and his present condition. Historical Naples is further recalled as the seat of the Angevin court, at which the troubadour Sordello stayed until his death in 1269, and as the capital of the Kingdom of Sicily from 1266.