In cantos XVI and XVII of the Inferno, Dante and his guide Virgil meet the monster Geryon, who alights on the edge of the abyss after Virgil has summoned him. In front, he has the face of an innocent man, but, behind, his body is a hideous combination of reptile, beast, and scorpion. After he lands, Virgil tells Dante to go and meet the sinners—usurers—in this circle of Hell. After doing so, Dante returns to Virgil, who has already mounted the creature. Dante mounts in front, Virgil’s arms around him, and Geryon ascends into the air, finally dropping the poets off in the next circle down.
Geryon has always been identified as an allegorical figure for fraud, but the specific language Dante uses tells us that he is particularly worried about how art can used to defraud. It must be “quel ver c’ ha faccia di menzogna”—a truth with the face of a lie—instead of what Geryon is: a lie with the face of truth. Geryon “venir notando“—comes swimming—through the air, but notare also means to note down, to write. He is an “imagine di froda“—an image, a representation, who is “dipinti“—painted—with knots and spirals and he has, like all art that leads astray, a poisonous “coda”: a deceitful lesson at the end.
There is also a weird metaphor about Germans and beavers:
I’ vidi per quell’aere grosso e scuro
venir notando una figura in suso,
maravigliosa ad ogne cor sicuro
sì come torna colui che va giuso
talora a solver l’àncora ch’aggrappa
o scoglio o altro che nel mare è chiuso
che ‘n sù si stende e da piè si rattrappa.
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