Malacoda


Malacoda is a character in Dante Alighieri's Inferno, where he features as the leader of the Malebranche, the twelve demons who guard Bolgia Five of Malebolge, the eighth circle of Hell. The name Malacoda is roughly equivalent to "bad tail" or "evil tail" in Italian. Unlike other characters such as Geryon, which are based on mythical characters, Malacoda was invented by Dante and is not a mythological reference.
He with his fiends guard the grafters, caught in boiling pitch to represent their sticky-fingered deals, torturing with grappling hooks whoever they can reach. Dante and Virgil gain a safe conduct from him and he allows the poets to cross to the next Bolgia. However, Malacoda lies to the poets about the existence of bridges over the sixth Bolgia, making him less a help and more an impediment. In the Inferno it does not state whether or not Malacoda chases the poets after his demons Grizzly and Hellken fall into the boiling pit of pitch. All the Inferno states is that the poets were being chased by the fiends before they escaped by sliding down a bank to the next Bolgia. Malacoda and his fiends cannot leave the fifth Bolgia of the grafters. It is said in the Inferno:
Malacoda also gives the reader the time by telling how long time it was since Bolgia Six passages collapsed;
Dante assumes that the crucifixion of Jesus took place in year 34, when a great earthshake came. It happened 12 o'clock am according to the Gospel of Luke, which means that the time for Dante would be approximately 7 o'clock am in the Holy Saturday.