After being made a prisoner during the 13th century wars between Italian cities, and convicted of treason, Ugolino della Gherardesca was imprisoned in February 1289 in the Tower of Hunger in Pisa, together with his two sons and two grandsons. The keys to the tower were thrown into the river so that they would starve to death. Ugolino, the last survivor, was condemned to Hell after watching his children die and eating their flesh.

"Thus, I saw them all (...) falling one by one (...) so much so that not seeing them any more, I threw myself, screaming and crawling, over their lifeless bodies, calling them two days after they died, and calling them again, until hunger extinguished in me what pain had left."