| Main | Origin | Quotes and Fun Facts | Gallery |
|---|
Origin[]
Illustration for Dante's Purgatorio 12 by Gustave Doré. This painting shows perfectly human pride. In fact, in Dante's hand, the prouds are burdened by the weight of huge boulders, they walk by reciting the Lord's Prayer. The weight that the souls are forced to wear matches the pride of their conduct: they are now bent in an effort to support it, while they were in life head-rights, participating in retaliation even the recitation of the prayer, which requires humility to beseech God to have mercy.
Boastful Spirit is based off one of the Seven Deadly Sins. In almost every list, pride (Latin, superbia), or hubris (Greek), is considered the original and most serious of the seven deadly sins, and the source of the others. It is identified as believing that one is essentially better than others, failing to acknowledge the accomplishments of others, and excessive admiration of the personal self (especially holding self out of proper position toward God). Dante's definition was "love of self perverted to hatred and contempt for one's neighbour". In Jacob Bidermann's medieval miracle play, Cenodoxus, pride is the deadliest of all the sins and leads directly to the damnation of the titulary famed Parisian doctor. In perhaps the best-known example, the story of Lucifer, pride (his desire to compete with God) was what caused his fall from Heaven, and his resultant transformation into Satan. In Dante's Divine Comedy, the penitents are burdened with stone slabs on their necks which force them to keep their heads bowed.