Composed in the middle of the twelfth century, the Visio Tnugdali (Vision of Tundale) was a harrowing account of a voyage through Hell experienced by a sinful knight named Tundale. Unlike the subjects of monastic tours of the underworld popular in the early Middle Ages, Tundale’s soul suffered the torments of the damned as his journey progressed ever deeper into Satan’s domain. The author’s ability to imagine the demonic denizens of Hell in all their horrifying detail and the cruel torments they inflicted on sinful souls was unrivaled in medieval literature. Translated from Latin into numerous languages and depicted in artwork, the grisly images conjured by this text left an indelible mark in the hearts and minds of generations of Christian readers.
When they had passed through dark and dry places, a house appeared before them, its doors open. This house that they saw was huge, as tall as a mountain in its great size, and it was round like an oven, where loaves are baked. Fire came out of it, which charred whatever souls it found within a thousand paces. But Tundale’s soul, which had learned a similar torment from another experience, could not approach any closer. To the angel who led him, he said, “Poor me, what will I do? Behold we approach the gates of death and who will free me?” The angel responded, “You will be freed from this flame outside, but you have to enter that house from which it pours forth.” And when they neared the house, they saw executioners with axes and knives and sticks and double-bladed instruments, with pickaxes and bores and very sharp scythes, with spades and shovels and other equipment. With these tools, they could flay or decapitate or cleave or hack as they stood before the doors in the midst of the flames and under their hands the multitude of souls endured all of the torments we have already discussed. When Tundale’s soul saw that this was much greater than all of the other penalties he had seen before, he said to the angel, “I pray, my lord, please free me from this punishment alone, and I will give myself over to all of the punishments that follow this one.” The angel replied, “This punishment is greater than all of the others that you have previously seen. Nevertheless, you will see all kinds of torments even greater than you were able to see or ponder before.” He continued, “To administer this punishment, rabid dogs await your arrival inside.” Trembling and weak with distress, with whatever prayers he could muster, Tundale asked to avoid this punishment. Nevertheless, he could not accomplish what he wished. When the demons saw that Tundale’s soul was giving in, they surrounded him and reproached him with a great outcry. Then they tore him to pieces with their instruments of torture and dragged his mangled soul into the flames. What can I say concerning what happened inside this house of Phristinus? For there was lamenting and sadness, pain and groaning and the gnashing of teeth. A tenacious fire was built outside, a vast conflagration inside. There was always an insatiable desire for food, and yet the excess of gluttony could not be sated. Their genitals were tortured with great wracking pains and corrupted with putrefaction that gushed with worms. These beasts burrowed not only into the genitals of laymen and laywomen, but also—even worse, which I cannot say without grave sorrow!—into the genitals of those abiding under the religious habit. No strength could suffice to endure these exhausting, ubiquitous tortures. No gender and no way of life was spared from these misfortunes. What I fear to relate, love compels me to say, that the monastic habit of men and women was present among those being tormented; and those whose profession seemed more holy were judged worthy of the harsher penalties. After Tundale’s soul had endured these and similar unspeakable torments for a long time, he returned to himself and confessed that he was guilty and worthy of such punishments. But when it pleased the divine will, without knowing how, as we said, Tundale realized that his torments were over. Nevertheless, he sat in the darkness and in the shadow of death. After he had sat there for a little while, he saw a light, namely the spirit of life, who had previously served as his guide.
As the angel led the way, they saw a beast very different from all of the other beasts they had previously seen. It had two feet and two wings, a very long neck, and an iron beak. It even had iron claws and from its mouth it vomited a relentless flame. This beast sat in a swamp that was frozen over with ice, where it devoured any souls it could find. While they were in its stomach, these souls were reduced to nothing as their punishment. The beast then regurgitated them onto the surface of the frozen swamp, where their torments were renewed once again. All of the souls that descended into the swamp, men as well as women, were pregnant, and burdened in this way they awaited the time when they would give birth. The offspring that they had conceived stung their entrails like vipers, causing these wretched souls to thrash about in the fetid waves of a sea of death hardened over with ice. When the time came to deliver, they screamed, filling the depths with their cries as they gave birth to serpents. I repeat that not only the women, but also the men gave birth to them, not through those parts that nature made for this function, but through their arms and likewise through their chests, and the serpents came bursting out through all of their limbs. These newly born beasts had heads of burning iron and the sharpest beaks, with which they shredded the bodies from which they emerged. On their tails, they had many spines like twisted fishhooks, with which they pierced those souls that gave birth to them. These beasts sought to leave their hosts, but when they could not extract their tails, they turned their burning iron heads back into the bodies and did not stop consuming them until they were reduced to raw nerves and dry bones. And so, crying out together, the grating of the icy waves and the screaming of the suffering souls and the growling of the emerging beasts reached to the heavens, so much so that the demons, if there were any spark of pity in them, might be rightly moved to feel mercy born of sympathy. For upon all of their limbs and fingers you could see the heads of many beasts that gnawed them down to the very nerves and bones. These beasts had living tongues like vipers, which consumed the roof of the mouth and the windpipe all the way down to the lungs. Likewise, the genitals of the men and the women were like serpents, which eagerly mangled the lower parts of their stomachs and pulled out their guts. Then Tundale said, “Tell me, I ask, what evil deeds have these souls committed, for which this punishment has been prepared, for I believe that it is not comparable to any of the torments I have ever seen.” The angel said, “As I told you earlier, because those who are considered to be holier are sentenced to harsher torments if they sin, it follows that they obtain a greater glory, if they do not earn this punishment through any kind of guilt.” He continued, “For this is the punishment of the monks, the canons, the nuns, and all other members of ecclesiastical orders, who either through their tonsure or through their habit are known to have lied to God. For this reason, their members are consumed by diverse pains because they acted without constraint. Indeed, they sharpened their tongues like serpents and thus they suffer these flames. Also their genitals, which were not restrained from the forbidden pleasure of sexual intercourse, are either cast away or they produce savage beasts to increase their pain.” And the angel added, “We have said enough about this. This punishment is particular to those who called themselves devout and were not; nonetheless, those who stained themselves with unbridled pleasure will also endure these torments. And for this reason, you will not escape this, because while you were in your body, you did not fear to defile yourself with immoderate behavior.” After the angel said these things, demons assaulted Tundale, seized his soul, and gave him to the beast to be devoured. Once consumed, his soul suffered either inside the creature or in the fetid swamp, but we should not repeat what we have said earlier. After Tundale experienced the punishment of the birth of the vipers, a spirit of pity appeared and talking softly it consoled him, saying, “Come, my dearest friend, you do not have to suffer this anymore.” And with a touch, the spirit healed him and enjoined him to follow him for the rest of the journey. Tundale did not know how far they went, for as we learned before, they had no light except for the brightness of the spirit of light. Indeed, they went through places that were terrible and more dire than what had come before. Their path was very narrow and it went down as though from the peak of the highest mountain into the depths, and the further he descended, the less Tundale hoped to return to life.
Then Tundale said, “Since we have seen so much evil thus far, so that I say what is worse could not be seen or even conceived, where again does this path lead from these so far into the depths?” The angel said in response, “That way leads to death.” And Tundale said, “Since this path is so very narrow and difficult and we have seen no one on it besides ourselves, is this what the Gospel referred to when it said, ‘Broad and wide is the way that leads to death and many enter through it’?”[2] The angel answered, “The evangelist did not speak about this road, but about the forbidden and shameless life of the world, for it leads through this to that.” After they went on further and struggled a great deal, they came into a valley and saw there many foundries of smiths, in which they could hear a loud lamenting. Tundale said, “Do you hear what I hear, my lord?” The angel answered, “I hear it and I understand.” And then Tundale asked, “Does this punishment have a name?” “This torturer is called Vulcanus,” said the angel, “through whose ingenuity many souls are toppled and tormented by him when they fall.” Tundale inquired, “My lord, do I deserve to suffer this punishment?” The angel replied, “You do.” And after he said this, the angel walked ahead and Tundale followed in tears. As they approached, torturers rushed toward them with burning tongs and ignoring the angel, they seized the soul that followed him. Holding him tight, they threw him into a forge burning with fire and fanned the flames with bellows. Just as iron is weighed, so too the souls were weighed until the multitude that burned there was reduced to nothing. When they were liquefied in this way, so that nothing appeared to remain except for water, they were pierced with iron pitchforks and placed upon an anvil. There they were struck with hammers until twenty or thirty or a hundred souls were rendered into a single mass. Even so, what is worse, they did not die in this way, even though they longed for death and could not find it. The torturers spoke to each of them, saying, “Is that enough?” And others attending another forge answered, “Throw them to us and let us see if it is enough.” When the demons threw them, others caught them with metal tongs before they struck the ground and, as before, dragged them through the flames. And thus, the wretched souls were tossed this way and that way, suffering and burning there until their skin and their flesh, their nerves and their bones were reduced to ash and a flickering flame. After Tundale’s soul was tossed in these torments for a long time, his advocate appeared to him and in the usual way took him from the midst of the flame and asked, “How are you doing? Were the delights of the flesh so sweet to you that for them you would endure so many and such awful torments?” Tundale could not respond because after such suffering he did not have the strength to utter a word. When the angel of the Lord saw that he was so sorely afflicted, speaking softly, he consoled Tundale, saying, “Take heart, because the Lord is the one who leads you into the depths and back out again. Therefore, be brave because even though the punishments you have suffered are bad, there are greater punishments from which you will be freed if that is the will of our redeemer. For God does not long for the death of the sinner, but for his conversion and return to life.” And after this, the angel said, “Everyone you saw above still awaits the judgment of God, but those who are in the depths below have already been judged, for you have not yet come to the very depths of Hell.” And leading him in the usual way, he comforted Tundale and bid him to undertake the rest of the journey.