Art, Symbol & Imagination
The Minotaur above the Broken Descent
A bull-headed figure crouches upon the rock above Dante and Virgil, its heavy body pressing against the slope beside their route. The Minotaur guards the approach to the seventh circle, where the path is broken into unstable fragments of rock. Doré places the creature above the smaller travellers, with its bent head and drawn-up limbs compressing its force into the narrow ledge. The caption recalls its Cretan origin through the poem’s wording. Virgil’s taunt will distract it long enough for the descent. This image is tied to that encounter, rather than to the labyrinth episode of the older myth or a general diagram of a hybrid creature.
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Citation
Gustave Doré (design). "The Minotaur above the Broken Descent" [editorial title]. In Dante's Inferno, Dante Alighieri. New Edition, undated supplied scan, undated edition, Thompson & Thomas. Source scan leaf 90. Lumitheca. /gallery/image/inferno-dore-83
Source details
Editorial title and description. Source details from the Library catalogue.
Full original plate and caption visually inspected. Editorial title; original scan tone and intrinsic damage retained. Sideways plates rotated in the Gallery derivative only.
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Gustave Doré (design). The Minotaur above the Broken Descent. Dante's Inferno. Scan leaf 90. Lumitheca. https://lumitheca.com/gallery/image/inferno-dore-83