Pholus

Pholus is a centaur stationed in the First Round of the Seventh Circle of Hell, the River of Blood, where the violent against their neighbors are punished. He is one of the three centaurs who initially challenge Dante and Virgil as they descend the broken ravine, and Virgil identifies him as a figure who was "so wrathful" in life, a characterization that aligns with the centaurs' role as guardians of this bolgia who shoot with arrows any soul that emerges from the boiling blood beyond the measure allotted by its crime.

Identity and Role in the Seventh Circle

When Dante and Virgil descend into the Seventh Circle, they encounter a moat of boiling blood, the Phlegethon, where tyrants and those who committed violence against their neighbors are immersed to a depth corresponding to their guilt. Along the embankment, centaurs run in file, armed with arrows, as they used to hunt in the world above. As the poets approach, three centaurs detach themselves from the squadron, with bows and arrows selected in advance. One of them cries out from afar, demanding to know what torment the poets are descending to, and threatening to draw his bow if they do not answer. Virgil responds that they will make their answer to Chiron, who is nearby, and rebukes the centaur for his hasty will. Virgil then identifies the three centaurs to Dante: the one who spoke is Nessus, who perished for the lovely Deianira and then took vengeance upon himself; the one in the middle, gazing at his breast, is the great Chiron, who brought up Achilles; and the other is Pholus, who was so wrathful. Virgil explains that thousands of centaurs go about the moat, shooting with shafts whatever soul emerges from the blood more than its crime allots.

Narrative Significance

Pholus appears only briefly in the narrative, but his presence contributes to the overall depiction of the centaurs as a fierce and punitive force within the Seventh Circle. His identification as "so wrathful" by Virgil serves to characterize him as a figure of uncontrolled anger, fitting his role as a guardian of the violent. The centaurs, as a group, represent the bestial and violent nature of the sins they oversee, and Pholus, along with Nessus and Chiron, embodies this function. After Virgil's rebuke, Chiron wheels about on his right breast and commands Nessus to guide the poets and warn aside any other band they may meet. Pholus does not speak again, and the narrative moves on with Nessus as the escort, leaving Pholus as a minor but integral part of the infernal landscape.