Dante recovers from his faint and finds himself in the third circle — a realm of cold, heavy, filthy rain falling without cease. Hail, dark water, snow. The gluttons lie in the mud like animals, wallowing, unable to lift themselves. Cerberus stands over them — three heads, red eyes, oily black beard, great belly, clawed hands — barking, tearing, flaying the spirits that lie before him. Virgil throws clods of earth into his three mouths to silence him and they pass.
One shade sits up when they pass, recognizing Dante as a living man. It is Ciacco — a Florentine, a man Dante knew, whose name means "pig" or "hog." He speaks with a surprising lucidity for a soul in this condition: he knows himself, knows why he is here (gluttony), and wants Dante to remember him when he returns to the world. Then, unprompted, he delivers a political prophecy about Florence: the city of division, the city where envy is so strong it overflows, will come to blows. One faction will drive out the other; within three years the tables will turn. He names a "just man" — probably Dante himself — who will not be heard. He points Dante toward Farinata, Tegghiaio, Jacopo Rusticucci, Arrigo, Mosca — proud souls he should know about. Where are they? In the deeper circles, where darker sins go. They pass on. Ciacco falls back into the blind filth.