Commentary Par I 37-45

This long and difficult beginning of the narrative portion of the final cantica may be paraphrased as follows: The Sun ('the lamp of the world') rises on us mortals from various points along the horizon, but from that point at which four circles intersect in such a way as to form three crosses (generally understood as the circles of the horizon, the equator, the zodiac, the colure of the equinoxes, the last three of which intersect the horizon in this way on the vernal equinox, March 21), it comes forth conjoined with a better constellation (Aries) and takes a better course, and it better tempers and imprints the material compound of the world with its informing power.  And from that point on the horizon it had made morning there, where almost all was light (Purgatory), and evening here, where almost all was dark (i.e., in the Northern Hemisphere). As Bosco/Reggio (DDP Bosco.Par.I.37-42) point out, Dante has marked the beginnings of all three cantiche with references to the time (Inf. II.1-5; Purg. I.13-30, 115-117).  Singleton refines the point (DDP Singleton.Par.I.44-45): Where Inferno begins at evening (around 6 pm) and Purgatorio at dawn (shortly before 6 am), Paradiso begins, more propitiously, at noon, the most 'noble' hour of the day (see [Purg XXXIII 104] and Conv.IV.xxiii.15).  And see the note in Bosco/Reggio to the following tercet (vv. 43-45) for some of the elaborate exegesis attached to the astronomical problems here.  For a detailed discussion in English, see Alison Cornish (Corn.2000.2), pp. 87-92.  The passage (vv. 37-54, in fact) offers numerous examples of enjambement in two (and more) successive terzine.  See Paratore (Para.1970.1), pp. 266-67, who points out that the first canto of the Paradiso is particularly marked by this phenomenon, which he counts as occurring a total of nine times, much more than is usual.