# Dante's most famous lines

Lines from the Divine Comedy (and the Vita Nuova) that became part of everyday Italian, with canto and canticle.

- 0 votes · 13 items
- Mar 1, 2023 · G. Mancini
- https://even.best/en/l/1248/dante-s-most-famous-lines

## Top 12

1. **Midway upon the journey of our life / I found myself within a forest dark** (0 · ▲0 ▼0) — The opening of the Comedy, Inferno I, 1-2.
2. **Abandon all hope, ye who enter here.** (0 · ▲0 ▼0) — The inscription over the gate of Hell, Inferno III, 9.
3. **You were not made to live like brutes, / but to follow virtue and knowledge.** (0 · ▲0 ▼0) — Ulysses' speech to his companions, Inferno XXVI, 119-120.
4. **Love, which absolves no beloved one from loving** (0 · ▲0 ▼0) — Francesca da Rimini, Inferno V, 103.
5. **There is no greater sorrow / than to recall a happy time / in misery** (0 · ▲0 ▼0) — Francesca, Inferno V, 121-123.
6. **So it is willed where what is willed can be done; ask no more.** (0 · ▲0 ▼0) — Virgil to Charon, Inferno III, 95-96.
7. **Let us not speak of them, but look and pass on.** (0 · ▲0 ▼0) — Virgil on the slothful, Inferno III, 51.
8. **And thence we came forth to see again the stars.** (0 · ▲0 ▼0) — The last line of the Inferno, XXXIV, 139.
9. **Ah, servile Italy, hostel of grief, / ship without a pilot in a great storm** (0 · ▲0 ▼0) — The invective against Italy, Purgatorio VI, 76-77.
10. **Follow me, and let the people talk.** (0 · ▲0 ▼0) — Virgil to Dante, Purgatorio V, 13; origin of the proverbial «follow your course and let people talk».
11. **You shall learn how salty another's bread tastes** (0 · ▲0 ▼0) — The prophecy of exile, Paradiso XVII, 58-59.
12. **The love that moves the sun and the other stars.** (0 · ▲0 ▼0) — The last line of the Comedy, Paradiso XXXIII, 145.
13. **So gentle and so honest appears / my lady when she greets others** (0 · ▲0 ▼0) — The sonnet for Beatrice in the Vita Nuova (c. 1294).

How is this ranking ordered? By people's votes: each ▲ adds a point and each ▼ takes one away. Anyone can vote and add what is missing.