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from the Inferno: Cantos V and XXXIV by Dante Alighieri
Reading Warm-up B
Read the following passage, paying special attention to the underlined words. Then, read it again,
and complete the activities. Write your answers on a separate sheet of paper.
Dante depended greatly on ancient Greek mythology
for his descriptions of hell in the Inferno. According to the
Greeks, all of the dead—both good and evil—were fated to
reside in a shadowy land referred to simply as the Underworld. The piteous, melancholy dead were ruled by
Hades, the stern and relentless brother of Zeus, king of
the gods.
Greek mythology describes nine rivers in the underworld. The most famous of these are the Acheron, the
Lethe, and the Styx. In the Inferno, Dante and Virgil are
borne across the Acheron by the grim ferryman Charon,
the son of Erebus and Nyx. The Greeks believed that
Charon would be so vexed if he were not paid for his services that he would refuse to row, so they placed a coin in
the mouth of everyone who died. This money allowed the
soul or shade to enter the underworld.
Although Charon was the principal guardian of the
Underworld, he was not alone. Other myths told of Cerberus, a fearsome, three-headed watchdog whose tail
had the scaly texture of a dragon. In Hercules’ twelfth
and final labor, the hero captured Cerberus.
Lethe was the Underworld river of forgetfulness. The
Greeks believed that anyone who drank from this river
would lose any memory of his or her past existence. By
divine decree, the gods swore their most sacred oaths by
the water of the Styx. If any blemish of perjury stained
such an oath, a god would suffer exile from divine society
for nine years.
Another set of ancient myths about the afterlife told
of Elysium, or the Elysian fields, where heroes who had
lived virtuously were rewarded with bliss after death.
Originally, Elysium was located at the ends of the earth.
Later, beliefs about this region converged, blending with
popular ideas of the Underworld.
Unit 5 Resources: From Decay to Rebirth
1. Underline the word that gives
a clue to the meaning of
piteous. If flowers were in a
piteous condition, what
would they look like?
2. Underline the words that hint
at the meaning of borne.
What word, consisting of the
word borne, describes an airplane in flight?
3. Circle the words that
describe what would cause
Charon to become vexed.
Explain how a vexed person
might behave.
4. Underline the words that
describe the tail’s texture.
Which of the five senses
would you use to learn about
the texture of something?
5. What is a synonym for
decree? Use decree in a
sentence of your own.
6. Circle the word that gives a
good clue to the meaning of
blemish. Use blemish in a
sentence of your own.
7. Underline the words that hint
at the meaning of bliss. Use a
word that is the opposite of
bliss in an original sentence.
8. Underline the word that hints
at the meaning of converged.
What is an antonym of
converged?
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