v. 97. Ottocar.] King of Bohemia, was killed in the battle of Marchfield, fought with Rodolph, August 26, 1278. Winceslaus II. His son,who succeeded him in the kingdom of Bohemia. died in 1305. He is again taxed with luxury in the Paradise Canto XIX. 123.
v. 101. That one with the nose deprest. ] Philip III of France, who died in 1285, at Perpignan, in his retreat from Arragon.
v. 102. Him of gentle look.] Henry of Naverre, father of Jane married to Philip IV of France, whom Dante calls “mal di Francia” -“Gallia’s bane.”
v. 110. He so robust of limb.] Peter III called the Great, King of Arragon, who died in 1285, leaving four sons, Alonzo, James, Frederick and Peter. The two former succeeded him in the kingdom of Arragon, and Frederick in that of Sicily. See G. Villani, 1. vii. c. 102. and Mariana, I. xiv. c. 9. He is enumerated among the Provencal poets by Millot, Hist. Litt. Des Troubadours, t. iii. p. 150.
v. 111. Him of feature prominent.] “Dal maschio naso”-with the masculine nose.” Charles I. King of Naples, Count of Anjou, and brother of St. Lonis. He died in 1284. The annalist of Florence remarks, that “there had been no sovereign of the house of France, since the time of Charlemagne, by whom Charles was surpassed either in military renown, and prowess, or in the loftiness of his understanding.” G. Villani, 1. vii. c. 94. We shall, however, find many of his actions severely reprobated in the twentieth Canto.
v. 113. That stripling.] Either (as the old commentators suppose) Alonzo III King of Arragon, the eldest son of Peter III who died in 1291, at the age of 27, or, according to Venturi, Peter the youngest son. The former was a young prince of virtue sufficient to have justified the eulogium and the hopes of Dante.
See Mariana, 1. xiv. c. 14.
v. 119. Rarely.]
Full well can the wise poet of Florence
That hight Dante, speaken in this sentence
Lo! in such manner rime is Dantes tale.
Full selde upriseth by his branches smale
Prowesse of man for God of his goodnesse
Woll that we claim of him our gentlenesse:
For of our elders may we nothing claime
But temporal thing, that men may hurt and maime.
Chaucer, Wife of Bathe’s Tale.
Compare Homer, Od. b. ii. v. 276; Pindar, Nem. xi. 48 and
Euripides, Electra, 369.
v. 122. To Charles.] “Al Nasuto.” -“Charles II King of Naples, is no less inferior to his father Charles I. than James and Frederick to theirs, Peter III.”