Il viaggio di Lopichis (Paolo Diacono, HL IV 37): discesa agli inferi e ascesa alla salvezza

This paper explores the tale – which is also a saga – of the escape of Lopichis, a Langobard, from the Avaro-Slavic captivity in the first half of the 7th century, described by Paul the Deacon in his Historia Langobardorum (book IV, chapter 37). Lopichis was the great-grandfather of Paul the Deacon. The analysis focuses on the episodes of the encounter with a wolf who tooks the leadership until Lopichis decided to shoot him with a bow; and the encounter with an old Slavic woman who saves the young man from the death. The tale written by Paul the Deacon is formed by two opposite sections: the first figures as a descensus ad inferos, the second as ascensio to the salvation.