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Hence they placed in it the Isles of the Blest, the ruddy Isle Erythea, on which the bright oxen of Geryon were pastured, and the Isle of the Hesperides. The apples are supposed by some to be the oranges of Spain, of which the Greeks had heard some obscure accounts. A celebrated exploit of Hercules was his victory over Antaeus.
With Gades were connected the myths of Hercules' expedition to the west, of his erection of the pillars, his defeat of Chrysaor of the golden sword, and his successful foray upon the flocks and herds of the triple Geryon.
The bulls of Geryon, enormous, gigantic, with gilded horns shining like flames, and behind them Hercules, covered with the skin of the Nemean lion, like Theron, his priest, in the great festivals of Saguntum, and his club, menacing on the height, shall be a signal to all the navigators of the Sucronian gulf. Ah! If only some day I realize this achievement!"
Cacus was a huge giant, who inhabited a cave on Mount Aventine, and plundered the surrounding country. When Hercules was driving home the oxen of Geryon, Cacus stole part of the cattle, while the hero slept.
Hence they placed in it the Isles of the blest, the ruddy isle Erytheia, on which the bright oxen of Geryon were pastured, and the isle of the Hesperides. The apples are supposed by some to be the oranges of Spain, of which the Greeks had heard some obscure accounts. A celebrated exploit of Hercules was his victory over Antaeus.
As far as I have been able to ascertain, Dante has no ancient gods among his devils, and the degree to which he had dissociated himself from ancient paganism may be gauged by the fact that in one of the most impassioned passages of his poem he addresses the Christian God as “Great Jupiter.” But he allows figures of ancient mythology such as Charon, Minos and Geryon to appear in his infernal world, and when he designates the pagan gods as “false and untruthful,” demonology is evidently at the back of his mind.
He thought she had been treacherous, and there was a great fight, in which he killed her, and carried off her girdle. Far out in the west, near the ocean flowing found the world, were herds of purple oxen, guarded by a two-headed dog, and belonging to a giant with three bodies called Geryon, who lived in the isle of Erythria, in the outmost ocean.
Now, as I have said, the things represented are various, but all must have something to do with fire, and must be subject to its action; and long before this there had been counterfeited the city of Sodom, with Lot and his daughters flying from it, at another time Geryon, with Virgil and Dante on his back, according as Dante himself relates in the Inferno, and even earlier Orpheus bringing Eurydice with him from those infernal regions, with many other inventions.
I found myself standing on my feet, with the tingling sensation of having come down rapidly upon the ground from a height. There was a similar feeling in my head, as of the whirling and sickening sensation of passing downwards through the air, like the description Dante gives of his descent upon Geryon.
Presently they heard the crash of the waterfall on the circle below, and then distinguished flaming fires and the noises of suffering. The monster Geryon, ever sullen as the falcon who seats himself at a distance from his dissatisfied master, shook his riders from off his back to the water's side, and then shot away like an arrow.
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