Apollo

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In the prologue of Paradise Dante addresses Apollo directly, calling him "O buono Appollo, a l'ultimo lavoro" (Par. I 13), where the epithet buono emphasizes his excellence as the god who inspires poetry. The note to the verse explains that with this invocation the poet now asks for the help of the other slope of Parnassus, the one inhabited by Apollo himself, distinct from the slope of the Muses invoked at the beginning of the previous canticles: the allegorical meaning sees in the Apollonian component the poetry that deals with divine realities, necessary for the new canticle. Apollo is also recalled as the god who, according to the Ovidian myth narrated in the note, pursued Daphne and, being unable to embrace her any longer after her metamorphosis into a laurel, declared that the plant would be his ("At quoniam coniunx mea non potes esse, / arbor eris certe, dixit, mea", Met. I 557-8); from this comes the Dantesque reference to the "diletto legno" of the laurel and the custom of crowning poets. A second invocation calls him to aid in Par. II 8: "Minerva spira, e conducemi Appollo".