[86] An interdict means that priests are to refuse sacred offices to all in the community, who are thus virtually subjected to the minor excommunication. [87] Guido died soon after his return in 1301. He had suffered in health during his exile. See _Inf._ x. 63. [88] Charles of Anjou had lost Sicily at the Sicilian Vespers, 1282. [89] _Purg._ xx. 76. [90] Witte attributes the composition of the _De Monarchia_ to a period before 1301 (_Dante-Forschungen_, vol. i. Fourth Art.), but the general opinion of critics sets it much later. [91] _Inf._ vi. 66, where their expulsion is prophesied. [92] Dante's authorship of the letter is now much questioned. The drift of recent inquiries has been rather to lessen than to swell the bulk of materials for his biography. [93] _Parad._ xvii. 61. [94] _Purg._ xxiv. 82. [95] See at _Purg._ xx. 43 Dante's invective against Philip and the Capets in general. [96] Henry had come to Italy with the Pope's approval. He was crowned by the Cardinals who were in Rome as Legates. [97] _Parad._ xxx. 136. High in Heaven Dante sees an ample chair with a crown on it, and is told it is reserved for Henry. He is to sit among those who are clothed in white. The date assigned to the action of the _Comedy_, it will be remembered, is the year 1300. [98] _Inf._ xix. 82, where the Gascon Clement is described as a 'Lawless Pastor from the West.' [99] The ingenious speculations of Troya (_Del Veltro Allegorico di Dante_) will always mark a stage in the history of the study of Dante, but as is often the case with books on the subject, his shows a considerable gap between the evidence adduced and the conclusions drawn from it. He would make Dante to have been for many years a satellite of the great Ghibeline chief. Dante's temper or pride, however we call it, seems to have been such as to preserve him from ever remaining attached for long to any patron. [100] _Inf._ x. 81. [101] The _Convito_ is in Italian, and his words are: 'wherever this language is spoken.' [102] His letter to the Florentines and that to the Emperor are dated in 1311, from 'Near the sources of the Arno'--that is, from the Casentino, where the Guidi of Romena dwelt. If the letter of condolence with the Counts Oberto and Guido of Romena on the death of their uncle is genuine, it has great value for the passage in which he excuses himself for not having come to the funeral:--'It was not negligence or ingratitude, but the poverty into which I am fallen by reason of my exile. This, like a cruel persecutor, holds me as in a prison-house where I have neither horse nor arms; and though I do all I can to free myself, I have failed as yet.' The letter has no date. Like the other ten or twelve epistles attributed to Dante, it is in Latin.