Cantos XVII and XVIII The Usurers and Panders, Seducers, and Flatterers

Canto XVII

Geryon, the monster called up from the Circles of Fraud, alights on the edge of the precipice. While Virgil talks to him, Dante goes to look at the shades of Usurers seated on the burning sand. The Poets then mount on Geryon's shoulders and are carried down over the Great Barrier to the Eighth Circle.

Canto XVIII

Dante now finds himself in the Eighth Circle (Malbowges), which is divided into ten trenches (bowges) containing those who committed Malicious Frauds upon mankind in general. The Poets walk along the edge of Bowge i, where Panders and Seducers run, in opposite directions, scourged by demons; and here Dante talks with Venedico Caccianemico of Bologna. As they cross the bridge over the bowge, they see the shade of Jason. Then they go onto the bridge over Bowge ii, where they see Thais, and Dante converses with another of the Flatterers who are here plunged in filth.