Cocytus.
Cocytus, meaning "the river of wailing", is a river in Hell and Avernus. Cocytus flows into the river Acheron, across which is the underworld, the mythological abode of the dead.
Overview[]
While the river Cocytus is normally used to imprison souls of the treacherous damned it can also apply to demons and fallen angels that have also broken a specific oath they have taken under the laws of Hell. The demons would be frozen beneath the bodies of the humans who were damned in Cocytus while also being chained to the riverbed. Many demons were tossed within the river Cocytus as these fiends had once been secretly conspiring against their masters in order to usurp them of their power and take their office for their own.
Even high-ranking demonic nobles and fallen angels are not spared nor are they given any special treatment when breaking one of the laws of Hell or an oath they took under their conjurer or master. Among the more prominent nobles was Belial himself who was defeated by Sparda, a Knight of Hell, and tossed within Cocytus. Mulciber, the grand architect of Hell, was also imprisoned within the river as he allied himself with Azazel into creating the Right Hand of Doom, releasing the Ogdru Jahad, and bring about the end of existence.
Description[]
Cocytus is also located in the lowest sector of Hell. There are three giants around the rim that are chained whom are identified as Nimrod, Antaeus, and Ephialtes; however Antaeus is unchained as he died before the Gigantomachy.
Cocytus is referred to as a frozen lake rather than a river, although it originates from the same source as the other infernal rivers, the tears of a statue called The Old Man of Crete which represents the sins of humanity.
Cocytus is described as being the home of traitors and those who committed acts of complex fraud. Depending on the form of their treachery, victims are buried in ice to a varying degree, anywhere from neck-high to completely submerged in ice.
Cocytus is divided into four descending "rounds," or sections:
- Caina: after the Biblical Cain; traitors to blood relatives.
- Antenora: after Antenor from the Iliad; traitors to country.
- Ptolomea: after Ptolemy, governor of Jericho, who murdered his guests (1 Maccabees); traitors to guests. Here it is said that sometimes the soul of a traitor falls to Hell before Atropos cuts the thread, and their body is taken over by a fiend.
- Judecca: after Judas Iscariot; traitors to masters and benefactors.
At the center of the circle buried waist deep in ice is the dark lord Dis. He is depicted as a massive terrifying beast with three faces and mouths along with six wings. The central mouth gnaws Judas, which many consider the most horrendous of fates. Judas is chewed head foremost with his feet protruding and the Devil's claws tearing his back forevermore while those gnawed in the side mouths, Brutus and Cassius, leading assassins of Julius Caesar, are both chewed feet foremost with their heads protruding. Under each chin Dis flaps a pair of wings, which only serve to increase the cold winds in Cocytus and further imprison him and other traitors.