two hundred years and more: Byzantium became the imperial seat in 330. Justinian became emperor in 527. Thus the eagle had stayed at Europe’s furthest edge for 197 years before it came to Justinian’s hand. Some commentators argue the Dante meant the period from 330 to Justinian’s military conquests in the east in 536. Such a reading brings the period to 206 years, justifying Dante’s “two hundred years and more.” It seems simpler, however, to assume that Dante made a mistake in his dates.

 

6. close to the mountains out of which it rose: The Trojan mountains. They are not far from Byzantium on a continental scale.

 

10-12. Caesar I was: On earth. But now only the name given him at the baptismal font is valid. which now I feel: May be taken to mean “now I am in Heaven” but the primary interpretation must be “now since my conversion.”

 

19-20. as closely as you see, etc.: As a first principle of logic, a statement that contradicts itself contains both truth and falsehood. Of two contradictory terms only one can be true and the other must be false. Dante uses it here as an example of what is self-evidently true to human Intellect. In Justinian’s present state (informed by divine revelation) the duality of Christ’s nature is as clear to him as is the nature of a logical contradiction to mortal intellect. (See also II, 45.)

 

25. Belisarius: Justinian’s famous general was born 505, died 565. His successful campaigns against the Ostrogoths restored most of the Empire’s authority over Italy. Dante seems not to have known that Justinian, in 562, in one of the endless intrigues of the Byzantine court, stripped “his” Belisarius of rank and had him imprisoned—an arrangement that became nearly standard as the Roman’s soldier’s pension plan.

 

31-33. DENUNCIATION OF THE GUELFS AND GHIBELLINES. Dante has asked to know (V, 126-127) the spirit’s identity and why he was in the Sphere of Mercury. Lines 1-27 answer Dante’s first question, but the nature of that reply moves Justinian to add a denunciation of both the Guelfs and the Ghibellines for opposing the true purposes of the Holy Roman Empire, whose history (and divine right) he then recounts. with how much right: None at all. the sacred standard: The Imperial Eagle. when they plot its subornation: The Ghibellines; they sought to suborn imperial authority to their own ends. or its overthrow: The Guelfs; they sought to end imperial authority and leave matters in the hands of local lords.

 

36. Pallas: Son of Evander, a Greek who had founded a kingdom on the present site of Rome. Evander joined Aeneas in fighting Tumus, king of the Rutulians. In the fighting Pallas was killed by Turnus. As a result of his victory, Aeneas acquired a kingdom that included the hereditary rights of Pallas. Thus Pallas died to give the eagle its first kingly state.