Through me you pass into the city of woe: Through me you pass into eternal pain: Through me among the people lost for aye. Justice the founder of my fabric moved: To rear me was the task of power divine, Supremest wisdom, and primeval love. Before me things create were none, save things Eternal, and eternal I shall endure. All hope abandon, ye who enter here.

The ensuing line L'ombra sua torna ch'era dipartita ("his spirit which had left us returns") is poignantly absent from the empty tomb. (The city council of Florence finally passed a motion rescinding Dante's sentence in June 2008. In 2007 a reconstruction of Dante's face was undertaken in a collaborative project.

: /ˈdænti/ US /ˈdɑːnteɪ/; Italian: [ˈdante]; c. His Divine Comedy originally called Commedia and later called Divina by Boccaccio is widely considered the greatest literary work composed in the Italian language and a masterpiece of world literature.