Editing Scylla (section)

== Narratives ==
[[Image:Castello scilla.jpg|thumb|The Rock of [[Scilla, Calabria]], which is said to be the home of Scylla]]According to [[John Tzetzes]]<ref>ad [[Lycophron]], [https://topostext.org/work/860#45 45]</ref>{{AI-generated source|date=November 2024}} and [[Maurus Servius Honoratus|Servius']] commentary on the ''[[Aeneid]]'',<ref>Servius on ''[[Aeneid]]'' III. 420.</ref> Scylla was a beautiful [[naiad]] who was claimed by Poseidon, but the jealous [[Nereid]] [[Amphitrite]] turned her into a terrible monster by poisoning the water of the spring where Scylla would bathe.

A similar story is found in [[Gaius Julius Hyginus|Hyginus]],<ref>[[Gaius Julius Hyginus|Hyginus]], ''[[Fabulae]]'' [https://topostext.org/work/206#199 199]</ref> according to whom Scylla was loved by [[Glaucus]], but Glaucus himself was also loved by the goddess sorceress [[Circe]]. While Scylla was bathing in the sea, the jealous Circe poured a baleful potion into the sea water which caused Scylla to transform into a frightful monster with six dog forms springing from her thighs. In this form, she attacked Odysseus' ship, robbing him of his companions.

In a late Greek myth, recorded in [[Eustathius of Thessalonica|Eustathius]]' commentary on Homer and John Tzetzes,<ref>ad Lycophron, [https://topostext.org/work/860#45 45]</ref>{{AI-generated source|date=November 2024}} [[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.

===Homer's ''Odyssey''===
[[File:Scylla figurine.jpg|thumb|200px| Scylla figurine, late 4th BCE. [[National Archaeological Museum, Athens]]]]

In Homer's ''[[Odyssey]]'' XII, [[Odysseus]] is advised 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."<ref>[[Robert Fagles]], ''The Odyssey'' 1996, XII.119ff.</ref> She also tells Odysseus to ask Scylla's mother, the river nymph [[Crataeis]], to prevent Scylla from pouncing more than once. Odysseus successfully navigates the strait, but when he and his crew are momentarily distracted by Charybdis, Scylla snatches six sailors off the deck and devours them alive.
{{poem quote|...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.<ref>Fagles 1996 XII.275–79.</ref>}}

===Ovid's ''Metamorphoses''===
[[File:Bartholomäus Spranger 006.jpg|thumb|upright|''Glaucus and Scylla'' by [[Bartholomeus Spranger]] (c. 1581)]]

According to [[Ovid]],<ref>Ovid, ''[[Metamorphoses]]'' xiii. 732ff., 905; xiv. 40ff.; translation by Nicholas Rowe and Samuel Garth is in [https://books.google.com/books?id=j24VAAAAYAAJ&dq=Ovid%20%20%22Glaucus%20and%20Scylla%22&pg=PA121 GoogleBooks]</ref> the fisherman-turned-[[Water deity|sea god]] Glaucus falls in love with the beautiful Scylla, but she is repulsed by his piscine form and flees to a [[promontory]] where he cannot follow. When Glaucus goes to Circe to request a love potion that will win Scylla's affections, the enchantress herself becomes enamored with him. Meeting with no success, Circe becomes hatefully jealous of her rival and therefore prepares a vial of poison and pours it into the sea pool where Scylla regularly bathed, transforming her into a thing of terror even to herself.

{{poem quote|In vain she offers from herself to run 
And drags about her what she strives to shun.<ref>Ovid, ''Metamorphoses'' [https://books.google.com/books?id=j24VAAAAYAAJ&dq=Ovid%20%20%22Glaucus%20and%20Scylla%22&pg=PA124 xiv.51–2]</ref>}}

The story was later adapted into a five-act tragic opera, ''[[Scylla et Glaucus]]'' (1746), by the French composer [[Jean-Marie Leclair]].

===Keats' ''Endymion''===
In [[John Keats]]' loose retelling of Ovid's version of the myth of Scylla and Glaucus in Book 3 of [[Endymion (poem)|''Endymion'']] (1818), the evil Circe does not transform Scylla into a monster but merely murders the beautiful nymph. Glaucus then takes her corpse to a crystal palace at the bottom of the ocean where lie the bodies of all lovers who have died at sea. After a thousand years, she is resurrected by [[Endymion (mythology)|Endymion]] and reunited with Glaucus.<ref>{{citation |title=Endymion Book III |url=http://www.gutenberg.org/files/24280/24280-h/24280-h.htm |at=line 401ff | via =Project Gutenberg}}</ref>