Ciacco

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In the sixth canto of the Inferno, among the gluttonous immersed in the mire beneath a heavy, foul-smelling rain, a damned soul sits up and addresses the pilgrim: "You citizens called me Ciacco." The poet recognizes him and turns to him with affectionate familiarity: "Ciacco, your affliction." Ciacco first points to his own city of origin, establishing with Dante a relationship between fellow citizens. The introduction to the canto describes him as "a Florentine, Ciacco, who will address Dante as he passes," "a character without any notoriety," chosen by Dante as the voice that judges the civil corruption of Florence, almost a symbol of the small and weak man who, from the shore of eternity, judges the powerful. The notes to the canto observe that the name, perhaps derived from the French Jacques or from the Tuscan Jacopo, is used by Dante in a context of seriousness and dignity, with an affectionate and respectful address, and recall that Ciacco has not been identified in the documents of the time: a voice that rises from nothing, from a person who does not matter, to judge the great.