The Seven-Storey Mountain: Mechthild of Hackeborn and Dante's Matelda

Abstract

In Purgatorio 28, after Dante has climbed the seven-storey mountain and expiated a sin on every terrace, he attains the summit.1 There he finds the Earthly Paradise, and in it a lady all alone, singing and gathering flowers. Radiant in her innocence, she tells him about the paradisal forest, especally its twin streams of Lethe and Eunoë. Both spring from the same fountain: one to erase the memory of sin, the other to restore that of every good deed (Purg. 28.121–33). Still nameless, she leads Dante to the pageant of the Church Triumphant and the longedfor Beatrice, who gives him a tongue-lashing. But after the chastened poet has confessed, the lady of paradise fulfills her ministry by baptizing him, first in Lethe, then in Eunoë. Momentarily stunned by these events, Dante asks Beatrice something he should have already known, and she responds, “Priega / Matelda che ’l ti dica” (Purg. 33.118–19). Thus, in passing, we learn the lady’s name.