Hector

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In Canto VI of Paradiso, during Justinian's discourse on the history of the imperial eagle, the mention of Hector is tied to the return of the eagle to the Troad with the exploits of Caesar. After the victory of Pharsalus on the Nile, the eagle "rivide e là dov'Ettore si cuba," that is, it saw again Antandrus, the port from which Aeneas' ships set sail, and the Simois, the river that crosses the plain of Troy, the setting of so many battles of the Iliad, and finally the place where Hector lies, his tomb. The summary of Caesar's exploits thus closes by ideally returning to the Trojan origin of the Roman people. The authorized note explicitly recalls Hector's tomb as the closing point of this list, evoking the Virgilian "tumulum." The entry does not reconstruct the entire Iliadic story of Hector and does not indicate other places in the Commedia beyond this verse.