Summary
On the border to the 9th circle lie the giants in the Giant's Well. They are in the pit (it is like a deep well,) and half of their giant bodies stand out of the well. They are bounded and cannot move, their natures are worse than their sins. Nimrod is th
Nimrod
created the Tower of Babel, talked bs in life, can't speak in death. In hell, his words don't make sense. He is a giant
Antaeus
a giant who is the son of Neptune. He is there for no specific reason. This indicates that people are placed here more for their general natures' as opposed to their sins. He is permitted to move, but the other giants are not allowed this.
Brutus and Cassius
killed Julius Caesar; they have their legs eaten by Satan but not their faces; they betrayed their master, in Judecca for this
Judas
killed Jesus; Satan chews on his face; he betrayed his master, in Judecca for this
they are not towers but giants. They stand in the well from the navel down; and stationed round its bank they mount guard on the final pit of Hell.
Virgil says this to Dante; the giants protect the final circle of hell
His babbling testifies the wrong he did on earth: he is Nimrod, through whose evil mankind no longer speaks a common tongue.
Virgil says this to Dante; Nimrod the giant can't talk, his pride and arrogance on earth and how he sought to conquer G-d denied him the right to speak in hell.
Each holds his face bowed toward the ice, each of them testifies to the cold with his chattering mouth, to his heart's tried with tears that flood forever from his eyes
sinners in 9th circle cry encased in ice, they cry forever and their tears freeze
I grabbed te hair of his dog's-ruff and I said: 'Either you tell me truly who you are, or you won't have a hair left on your head.'
Dante says this to the sinner he kicks in Helll (Bocca is his name); Dante's roughness and aggression toward the sinner is a good thing, he has learned
As a famished man chews crusts--so the sinner sank his teeth into the other's nape at the base of the skull, gnawing his loathsome dinner.
Ugolino eats the man who starved him in life; both partook in illegal treason together, but Rugieri (the guy he eats) went against Ugolino, and now gets eaten for it
Some lie stretched out; others are fixed in place upright, some on their heads, some on their soles; another, like a bow, bends foot to face.
this is describing the final section of the 9th circle, the sinners are completely under the ice and are twisted and uncomfortable and cannot talk or cry; these people betrayed their masters/lords
I did not die, and yet I lost life's breath: imagine yourself what I became, deprived at once of both my life and death.
Dante is so horrified he feels like he lost life and is not dead yet; he is neither for that moment of shock at seeing the final section of the 9th circle
Under each head two wings rose terribly, their span proportioned to so gross a bird: I never saw such sails upon the sea.
Satan's (Lucifer's) wings cannot stop beating, freezes all of hell, symbolizes that evil is stupid and has no logic and is destructive
'Hold fast!' my Guide said, and his breath came shrill with labor and exhaustion. 'There is no way but by such stairs to rise above such evil.'
Virgil says this; the only way to escape hell is to climb up evil, or symbolically prevail over it