Scylla

Scylla. Detail from a red-figure bell-crater, 450–425 BC.

The Rock of Scilla, Italy, today.

In Greek mythology, Scylla (pronounced /ˈsɪlə/; Greek: Σκύλλα, Skulla)^[1] was a monster that lived on one side of a narrow channel of water, opposite its counterpart Charybdis. The two sides of the strait were within an arrow's range of each other—-so close that sailors attempting to avoid Charybdis would pass too close to Scylla and vice versa.

Traditionally the strait has been associated with the Strait of Messina between Italy and Sicily, but more recently this theory has been challenged, and the alternative location of Cape Scilla in northwest Greece has been suggested by Tim Severin.^[2]

The phrase "between Scylla and Charybdis" has come to mean being in a state where one is between two dangers and moving away from one will cause you to be in danger from the other.

Scylla was a grotesque sea monster, with six long necks equipped with grisly heads, each of which contained three rows of sharp teeth. Her body consisted of twelve tentacle-like legs and a cat's tail and with four to six dog-heads ringing her waist. She was one of the children of Phorcys and either Hecate, Crataeis, Lamia or Ceto (all of whom may be various names for the same goddess). Some sources, including Stesichorus cite her parents as Triton and Lamia.

In literature

Homer's Odyssey

In Homer's Odyssey XII, Odysseus is given advice by Circe to sail closer to Scylla, for Charybdis could drown his whole ship: "Hug Scylla's crag—sail on past her—top speed! Better by far to lose six men and keep your ship than lose your entire crew"^[3] she warns and tells Odysseus to bid Crataeis prevent her from pouncing more than once. Odysseus then successfully sails his ship past Scylla and Charybdis, but Scylla manages to catch six of his men, devouring them alive:

"...they writhed
gasping as Scylla swung them up her cliff and there
at her cavern's mouth she bolted them down raw—
screaming out, flinging their arms toward me,
lost in that mortal struggle."^[4]

Ovid

According to Ovid,^[5] Scylla was once a beautiful nymph. The fisherman-turned-sea-god Glaucus fell madly in love with her, but she fled from him onto the land where he could not follow. Despair filled his heart. He went to the sorceress Circe to ask for a love potion to melt Scylla's heart. As he told his tale of love about Scylla to Circe, she herself fell in love with him. She wooed him with her sweetest words and looks, but the sea-god would have none of her. Circe was furious, but with Scylla and not with Glaucus. She prepared a vial of very powerful poison and poured it in the pool where Scylla bathed. As soon as the nymph entered the water, she was transformed into a frightful monster with twelve feet and six heads, each with three rows of teeth. Angry, growling wolf heads grew from her waist, and she tried to brush them off. She stood there in utter misery, unable to move, loathing and destroying everything that came into her reach, a peril to all sailors who passed near her. Whenever a ship passed, each of her heads would seize one of the crew.

Other

In a late Greek myth,^[6] it was said that Heracles encountered Scylla during a journey to Sicily and slew her. Her father, the sea-god Phorcys, then applied flaming torches to her body and restored her to life.

According to John Tzetzes^[7] and Servius' commentary on the Aeneid^[8] Scylla was a beautiful nyad who was claimed by Poseidon, but Amphitrite turned her into a monster.

Scylla is rationalised in the Aeneid as a dangerous rock outcropping.

The character of Sin from John Milton's Paradise Lost is similar to Scylla. Scylla and Charybdis are actually mentioned at one point in the poem.

In the video game "Castlevania: Symphony of the Night" Scylla is a boss monster that has the upper torso of a female and the lower part of an octopus. It also has wolf heads on the sides and it can attack with snake heads. [1]

In the movie Marathon Man, Scylla is the code name of the spy/assassin Henry "Doc" Levy. In the novel of the same name, he is often refferred to as "Scylla", or "Scylla the Rock" because of both his strength and ability to kill bare-handed.

In Season 4 of the television series Prison Break Scylla is used as the name of the 6 cards used by the Company which contain the names and information of the Company's inner workings.

Notes

References

• Hanfmann, George M. A., "The Scylla of Corvey and Her Ancestors" Dumbarton Oaks Papers 41 "Studies on Art and Archeology in Honor of Ernst Kitzinger on His Seventy-Fifth Birthday" (1987), pp. 249–260. Hanfman assembles Classical and Christian literary and visual testimony of Scylla, from Mesopotamian origins to his ostensible subject, a ninth-century wall painting at Corvey Abbey.

External links

Look up scylla in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

• Theoi Project, Skylla references in classical literature and ancient art.

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