Scylla and Charybdis
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Scylla and Charybdis are two sea monsters of Greek mythology situated on opposite sides of a narrow channel of water, so close that sailors attempting to avoid Charybdis will pass too close to Scylla and vice versa. 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, and is believed to be the progenitor of the phrase "between a rock and a hard place". Scylla lived on the cliffs and Charybdis was a dangerous whirlpool. Neither fate was more attractive as both were difficult to overcome.
The phrase "caught between the Scylla and Charybdis" was included in the lyrics to the 1984 hit single "Wrapped Around Your Finger" by the musical group, The Police.
[edit] Location
- Main article: Geography of the Odyssey.
Traditionally the aforementioned channel 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 Skilla in northwest Greece has been suggested. Dutch-born writer Iman Wilkens locates Scylla and Charybdis at St Michael's Mount. The names of the Isles of "Scilly" and "Carbis" Bay seem reminders of this connection. Henriette Mertz, an American archaeologist, proposed in her book "The Wine Dark Sea: Homer's Heroic Epic of the North Atlantic" (1964) that Scylla and Charybdis was in the Bay of Fundy, known to have the greatest difference in water level between its high and low tides in the world.
 Places visited by Odysseus in Odyssey  |
|---|
| Ismaros - The island of Lotophagi - The island of Polyphemus - Aiolia - Telepylos - Aeaea |
| The Underworld - The Sirens - Scylla and Charybdis - Thrinacia - Ogygia - Scheria - Ithaca |
