Illustrations for Dante's Divine Comedy (1480-1500)

Botticelli often concerned himself during his lifetime with illustrations for Dante's Divine Comedy. He executed the drawings from the cycle illustrated here over a relatively long period of time, from about 1480 to 1500. The identification of these illustrations with the Dante cycle which Botticelli is known to have done for Lorenzo di Pierfrancesco, his great patron from the Medici family, seems not improbable.

For some reason unknown to us, the drawings were never completed. Only four of the surviving 93 sheets - nine having been lost in the course of time - are coloured, although this was presumably the original intention for all of them. The drawings are now in the collections of the Staatliche Museen in Berlin and the Vatican Library.

Dante wrote over 14.000 verses describing his visionary journey through the kingdoms of Hell (Inferno), Purgatory (Purgatorio) and Paradise (Paradiso). The epic is divided into 100 cantos: 34 for Hell and 33 each for Purgatory and Paradise. Dante is at first guided on his journey by the classical poet Virgil, but in Paradise he is led by his muse, Beatrice. During his journey Dante meets a large number of nameless people, and also famous personalities from the past and his own age. Every one of them has received the place he deserves as a result of the offences or merits of his life.