Medusa

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In mythological tradition Medusa is the third of the three Gorgons, daughters of the sea god Phorcys, whose gaze had the power to turn into stone anyone who looked at her. Perseus, with the help of Minerva, cut off her head, which kept its power fully intact even after being separated from the body. Dante knew the myth through Ovid (Metamorphoses IV 779-81) and used it according to medieval tradition to symbolize an event of Christian ethics: according to the medieval interpretation adopted, Medusa represents the despair of salvation, a form of fear that clouds the mind and darkens the sight, capable of petrifying the soul. In Inferno IX, during the episode of the entry into the city of Dis, the three Furies invoke her presence so that anyone who sees her face may become stone ("di smalto").