The Cyclopes

We sailed hence, always in much distress, till we came to the land of the lawless and inhuman Cyclopes. Now the Cyclopes neither plant nor plough, but trust in providence, and live on such wheat, barley, and grapes as grow wild without any kind of tillage, and their wild grapes yield them wine as the sun and the rain may grow them. They have no laws nor assemblies of the people, but live in caves on the tops of high mountains; each is lord and master in his family, and they take no account of their neighbours.

Odysseus; the Odyssey, Book IX

The basic image of the Cyclops—giant humanoids with one eye in the center of their forehead—is nearly as recognizable today as it would have been in Ancient Greece. However, most of their stories have been neglected over time. There were at least three distinct groups of Cyclopes in Greek mythology, two of whom were known as skilled craftsmen who contributed to their societies. However, the Odyssey leans heavily into the other interpretation of the creatures by presenting them as lawless brutes.

After escaping the island of the Lotus Eaters, Odysseus and his crew end up on the Island of the Cyclopes. Hoping to steal food and acquire a guest-present, Odysseus and a small group of his men enter the cave of Polyphemus, who seals the entrance with a large stone upon returning home. Rather than offering them hospitality, Polyphemus kills and eats six of Odysseus’s men.

In general, this period of mythology depicted the Cyclopes as monsters. They didn’t follow Greek customs or honor the Gods, and many enjoyed eating humans. However, there is a sympathetic side to Polyphemus. He is depicted as gentle and loving toward his animals, and his actions become more reasonable in light of Odysseus invading his home first. Though the Cyclopes are shown as easily tricked (famously believing Polyphemus was in no danger because of his claim that “No man [or Nobody] is killing me”), they certainly knew how to get revenge. Like most of the known Cyclopes of this time, Polyphemus was a child of Poseidon, and he asked his father to get revenge on Odysseus for abusing him.

The Laestrygonians

Forthwith he set about killing my men. He snatched up one of them, and began to make his dinner off him then and there, whereon the other two ran back to the ships as fast as ever they could. But Antiphates raised a hue and cry after them, and thousands of sturdy Laestrygonians sprang up from every quarter- ogres, not men. They threw vast rocks at us from the cliffs as though they had been mere stones, and I heard the horrid sound of the ships crunching up against one another, and the death cries of my men, as the Laestrygonians speared them like fishes and took them home to eat them.

Odysseus, the Odyssey, Book X

Perhaps the least-remembered of the mythical creatures in the Odyssey, the Laestrygonians are a race of man-eating giants that Odysseus faces after escaping Poseidon’s wrath. Finding land after a week in turbulent waters, Odysseus orders three of his men to learn about the region’s occupants. Instead of finding mortals, however, the scouts find the queen, described as “a giantess as huge as a mountain.”

When she calls her husband, Antiphates, he promptly eats one of the scouts. The other two make it back to the harbor in time to warn Odysseus, but they are not quick enough to save the full group. Antiphates summons thousands of other Laestrygonians, who launch boulders at their ships and drag the dying men home for dinner.

The Laestrygonians are the most devastating force that Odysseus’s crew faces in their journey home. While prior encounters killed a few men, the giants destroy 11 of the fleet’s 12 ships. All the men onboard either drown, are crushed, or are eaten. Despite this, the entire ordeal only merits four paragraphs in the original story, and nearly every other source includes a retelling of Homer’s version with minimal detail. Because of this, they are frequently forgotten when people think about the monsters from the Odyssey.

Circe

I will tell you of all the wicked witchcraft that Circe will try to practice upon you. She will mix a mess for you to drink, and she will drug the meal with which she makes it, but she will not be able to charm you … you make her swear solemnly by all the blessed that she will plot no further mischief against you, or else when she has got you naked she will unman you and make you fit for nothing.

Hermes; the Odyssey, Book X

If the Laestrygonians are under-appreciated by fans of the Odyssey, Circe is probably over-appreciated, appearing in other myths, modern retellings, and even comic books thanks to her complex role in the epic. She is best remembered as an antagonist, turning Odysseus’s men into pigs, but she ends up being Odysseus’s greatest ally apart from Athena herself.

Referred to in different places as a goddess, sorceress, or nymph, Circe is hard to place within the mythic landscape. Homer claims that she was the daughter of the god Helios and a nymph named Perse, who was herself a child of the Titans Oceanus and Tethys. However, some myths list her as a child of Hekate, the goddess of witchcraft. This discrepancy is likely due to her proficiency with magic, which she wields using food, potions, and a magic wand.

When she had got them into her house, she set them upon benches and seats and mixed them a mess with cheese, honey, meal, and Pramnian but she drugged it with wicked poisons to make them forget their homes, and when they had drunk she turned them into pigs by a stroke of her wand, and shut them up in her pigsties.

Odysseus, the Odyssey, Book X

Circe begins the Odyssey as an antagonist when she transforms many of Odysseus’s surviving crew members into pigs. However, she becomes a crucial helper for Odysseus once he makes her promise not to harm him. She returns his men to human form, hosts them for a year, and directs Odysseus to the Underworld to receive a prophecy about his journey. Once he returns, she also advises him on how to survive the monsters he will face on the way to Ithaca.

Though she is undoubtedly a vital part of Odysseus’s journey, Circe has many other roles in the wider mythological world. Before meeting Odysseus, Circe helped the Argonauts by cleansing them of the stain of murdering Medea’s brother, which allowed them to continue their journey. However, she wasn’t always helpful. Circe had two love interests before Odysseus, both of whom rejected her. In response, Circe transformed the mortal King Picus into a bird, while punishing the sea god Glaucus by transforming his beloved Scylla into the sea monster who will be described in more detail below.

Now you shall know what one who’s wronged, who loves, who’s woman too—and I that loving woman wronged—can do!

Circle; Ovid, Metamorphoses 14.308

After the events of the Odyssey, Circe’s primary role in mythology came from her children. While none are mentioned in Homer’s works, other Greek sources explain that Circe bore Odysseus between one and three children. The names provided for those children vary, but the most prominent is Telegonus. His story was recorded in the lost epic poem the Telegony, where, in seeking to meet his father, Telegonus accidentally kills Odysseus instead. Once he realizes what happened, Telegonus brings Penelope and Telemachus to his mother’s island. They bury Odysseus and host a double wedding: Telegonus to Penelope and Circe to Telemachus.

Modern interpretations continue to struggle with how to present Circe. On the one hand, she is a temptress who transformed men into animals and was eager to castrate Odysseus after seducing him. On the other, she was instrumental in the success of two epic quests. She is a femme fatale, a symbol of sexual liberation, and a woman claiming power in a man’s world. No wonder writers have spent millennia trying to pin her down.

Spirits of the Dead

When I had prayed sufficiently to the dead, I cut the throats of the two sheep and let the blood run into the trench, whereon the ghosts came trooping up from Erebus- brides, young bachelors, old men worn out with toil, maids who had been crossed in love, and brave men who had been killed in battle, with their armour still smirched with blood; they came from every quarter and flitted round the trench with a strange kind of screaming sound that made me turn pale with fear.

Odysseus; the Odyssey, Book XI

It’s common for great heroes to journey into the land of the dead in ancient literature, which is precisely what takes place in Book XI of the Odyssey. After performing a ritual that Circe taught him, Odysseus summons the spirits of the dead. While he came to the Underworld for a seer named Tiresias, he also meets with other Greek heroes, his mother, and a crew member who had accidentally died on Circe’s island.

The structure of the Underworld changed drastically, depending on who was writing the story, but the Odyssey had one of the more straightforward interpretations. Most of the dead, known as ghosts or shades, spent their afterlives wandering the Fields of Asphodel, a region of the Underworld which was known for being dreary but not torturous. While there, the shades had very little memory or personality, roaming aimlessly. They could regain their memories by drinking ritual blood to interact with the living, but they could not physically contact them, as they had “no strength nor substance any more.”

There were some circumstances where the dead retained their minds without drinking the blood. For example, Odysseus’s crew member, Elpenor, tells Odysseus how he died and demands that Odysseus go back to bury him “or I may bring heaven’s anger upon you.” Spirits who had not received proper burials were not allowed to fully enter the Underworld and might return to the world of the living, as we might see in a modern haunting.

Those who had entered the Underworld seemed to regain their memories based on the will of the Gods. Tiresias was able to keep his mind while in the Underworld because Persephone valued his prophecies. Other shades had some level of awareness in order to fully experience their punishments or blessings. Finally, new souls appeared to retain their consciousness immediately after being delivered to the Underworld by Hermes, though this level of awareness would likely fade over time until they were as mindless as the other shades.

Sirens

First you will come to the Sirens who enchant all who come near them. If any one unwarily draws in too close and hears the singing of the Sirens, his wife and children will never welcome him home again, for they sit in a green field and warble him to death with the sweetness of their song. There is a great heap of dead men’s bones lying all around, with the flesh still rotting off them.

Circe; the Odyssey, Book XII

Contrary to the modern presentation of sirens as mermaids’ evil cousins, the original sirens were half-human, half-bird creatures who sat in a meadow of flowers and sang to lure sailors to their deaths. According to Apollonius Rhodius in the Argonautica, the Sirens were originally handmaidens for Persephone before her abduction. Their avian forms came from Demeter, who either gave them wings to search for her daughter or punished them with the transformation because they did not find her.

Odysseus comes upon two of the Sirens in his travels, but his men avoid crashing their ship by sealing their ears with wax. While modern interpretations often claim that the singing itself seduces listeners, the Odyssey depicts the Sirens as attractive because of their knowledge. They tell Odysseus, “we know all the ills that the gods laid upon the Argives and Trojans before Troy, and can tell you everything that is going to happen over the whole world.”

Despite only serving as a brief temptation for Odysseus, the Sirens appear elsewhere in Greek mythology as lethal forces. The Argonauts had to pass by them, and though Orpheus drowned out part of their song, one member of the group still jumped overboard to get to them. Furthermore, Ptolemy Hephaestion included a group of Centaurs as their victims, along with Odysseus’s son, Telemachus. Since the average mortal doesn’t stand a chance against the Sirens, they are generally used to prove that the hero of the story is greater than other men.

Scylla

Scylla pounced down suddenly upon us and snatched up my six best men. I was looking at once after both ship and men, and in a moment I saw their hands and feet ever so high above me, struggling in the air as Scylla was carrying them off, and I heard them call out my name in one last despairing cry.

Odysseus; the Odyssey, Book XII

Scylla is most frequently referenced along with her counterpart, Charybdis, when Greek heroes have to choose between two no-win scenarios. Scylla is a six-headed monster with twelve feet and three rows of teeth. Later writings describe her as having a scaled lower half, with the heads or jaws of dogs around her waist. Circe advises Odysseus that “No ship ever yet got past her without losing some men, for she shoots out all her heads at once, and carries off a man in each mouth.”

As previously mentioned, many sources believe that Scylla was once a beautiful maiden who was transformed into a monster by jealous women. One version of the story explains that Circe made her this way after being rejected by Glaucus, while another suggests that Scylla was targeted by Amphitrite after her husband Poseidon fell for her. From that point on, Scylla became a threat to any hero trying to pass through the Strait of Messina.

Following Circe’s advice, Odysseus steers his ship toward Scylla, who captures and eats six of his men in what he described as “the most sickening sight that I saw throughout all my voyages.” However, other ancient heroes seemed capable of avoiding the threat altogether. The Argonauts were aided by Hera, who ordered a sea nymph to perfectly navigate their ship between Scylla and Charybdis. Aeneas chose to detour around the strait rather than having to face either. Despite this, the idea of choosing between Scylla and Charybdis remains one of the most enduring no-win situations in fiction.

Charybdis

Charybdis kept sucking up the salt water. As she vomited it up, it was like the water in a cauldron when it is boiling over upon a great fire, and the spray reached the top of the rocks on either side. When she began to suck again, we could see the water all inside whirling round and round, and it made a deafening sound as it broke against the rocks. We could see the bottom of the whirlpool all black with sand and mud, and the men were at their wit’s ends for fear.

Odysseus; the Odyssey, Book XII

While Scylla has a backstory and personality, Charybdis is a force of nature. According to Circe, Charybdis is a whirlpool under a large fig tree, which sucks water in and out three times per day. While this predictability might seem comforting, the Odyssey makes it clear that there is no outsmarting Charybdis. If you sail too close, your ship will be sucked in and destroyed.

Despite being personified, Charybdis rarely gets attention outside of her dichotomy with Scylla. The Argonauts and Aeneas avoid her, and few other myths mention her at all. However, the Odyssey does suggest one way to survive an encounter. After his ship is sucked into her whirlpool, Odysseus jumps onto the fig tree and clings to it for hours until the ruins of his ship are released. As with many aquatic disasters, the only way out is persistence and luck.

The Immortal Herds of Helios

You will now come to the Thrinacian island, and here you will see many herds of cattle and flocks of sheep belonging to the sun-god—seven herds of cattle and seven flocks of sheep, with fifty head in each flock. They do not breed, nor do they become fewer in number, and they are tended by the goddesses Phaethusa and Lampetie, who are children of the sun-god Hyperion by Neaera.

Circe; the Odyssey, Book XII

Helios, the God of the Sun, kept 350 sheep and 350 cattle on the island Thrinacia, where they were tended to by his daughters. These animals were functionally immortal, as they did not age or die naturally. Though they otherwise seemed like normal livestock, they acted unnaturally if killed by man. Odysseus described that “the hides of the cattle crawled about, and the joints upon the spits began to low like cows, and the meat, whether cooked or raw, kept on making a noise just as cows do.”

While most mythical creatures in the Odyssey actively attack Odysseus and his crew, Helios’s cattle and sheep have a more passive role. Both Tiresias and Circe warn Odysseus that if he or his men harm them, they will suffer a terrible fate. After the crew kills several of the cows for food, Helios marches to Olympus to demand justice, threatening to take away the sun if Zeus does not punish the perpetrators. He does so by creating a storm around the ship, tearing the vessel apart and killing all who ate the sacred meat.

Calypso

She was busy at her loom, shooting her golden shuttle through the warp and singing beautifully. Round her cave there was a thick wood of alder, poplar, and sweet smelling cypress trees, wherein all kinds of great birds had built their nests- owls, hawks, and chattering sea-crows that occupy their business in the waters. … Even a god could not help being charmed with such a lovely spot.

The Odyssey, Book V

The final mythical being that Odysseus meets is Calypso, described as both a goddess and a nymph. Calypso was a child of Atlas who lived alone on an island known as Ogygia. Odysseus washes up on her island after surviving Charybdis, and she takes him in. While this originally comes across as kindness, Calypso refuses to let Odysseus leave, keeping him on Ogygia for seven years and using him for sex.

This is a rare example of a story depicting sexual assault against a man, and it does a good job showcasing how violating the experience is. The text frequently describes Calypso with an epithet about her hair, a common Greek shortcut to emphasize her beauty. In addition, Ogygia is described as a paradise, and Odysseus describes how Calypso “had taken as good care of him as though he had been a god” and offered him immortality.

Despite so many theoretically good things, Athena describes Odysseus as “tired of life,” and when Hermes arrives on Ogygia, Odysseus is “looking out upon the barren ocean with tears in his eyes, groaning and breaking his heart for sorrow”—as he apparently does every day. Though she might have outwardly treated Odysseus kindly, Calypso was his jailor and abuser, and she would not have let him go without an order from Zeus.

Perhaps as punishment for her actions, Calypso does not receive a happy ending from other writers. Pseudo-Hyginus claimed that Calypso killed herself after Odysseus left, while Propertius stated that “she wept to the lonely waves: for many days she sat disconsolately with unkempt tresses uttering many a complaint to the unjust sea.” Some ancient texts mention Calypso having children with Odysseus, but the sources disagree on the number, gender, and names of his children. Whether she bore Odysseus’s children or not, Calypso suffers after letting him go, never finding reciprocal love in any ancient sources.

Quotations are from the Samuel Butler translation of the Odyssey, made available by the Internet Classics Archive.

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