Purgatorio 16: Marco Lombardo

Giotto: Wrath

Dante interlaces several heterogeneous elements in this canto, not all of them in any obvious way linked to wrath. To name only a few:

• The intense darkness of the fummo, the acrid smoke that envelopes the entire canto;
• The theme of free will introduced by Marco Lombardo in response to Dante's questioning of the origin of evil;
• The free are subject to a higher nature that creates the human mind;
• Multiple metaphors of knots tied and loosed;
  
• The joy of the creator;
• The innocent new soul, that "knows nothing" -- sa nulla -- other than what pleases;
  
• The necessity for a guide, law;
• The Two Suns of Pope and Emperor - the relation of religion and state;
• The three men through whose nobility "the old times reprove the new"

Any thoughts about why these ingredients -- some of them major themes -- come into play in this canto of wrath?