La tradizione visionaria in Francia ai tempi di Dante: il caso di Pierre de l’Hôpital

After investigating the common elements between Dante’s poem and the textual typology of the allegorical voyage, the paper compares the Commedia with Pierre de l’Hôpital’s Voie d’Enfer et de Paradis (1315-1336), shedding light on the evolution achieved by this literary genre in early fourteenth-century France. The concordant treatment of many themes and motifs in the two texts (such as the form of a double journey to Evil and Good, the topographical arrangement of the itineraries or the centrality of penitence understood in the contritionist sense) clashes with the divergent positions taken by their authors in the face of the theological ineffability, clearly evident from the opposing symbolism given to the key image of the golden eagle. Hence also the gap due to respect or infringement of the frontier between the moral realm and eschatology.