"Are there any monsters in Canto XXXI and if so what purpose do they serve? If there are no "monsters" what does their absence signify?" 1. There are four monsters mentioned in Canto XXXI, these monsters were Nimrod, Ephialtes, Briareus, and Anataeus. These monsters were sentenced to stand between the eight and the ninth circle because they had challenged authorities who they were not supposed to do. The giant Nimrod "he is his own accuser./This …showed first 75 words of 369 total…

…showed last 75 words of 369 total…explained to Dante that what he was looking at was not towers but actually giants who stand between in a pit between the eight and the ninth circle. Their stomach and below was not seen by the travelers as they came up to them because it was covered below the cliff's edge. "These are not towers,/but giants and, from the navel down,/each stands behind the bank that rings the pit."(Canto XXXI, 32-33).