The Myth of Scylla | The Price of Six Men Circe Foretold

A narrow strait lies between two facing cliffs. On one cliff, midway up, there is a great cave opening toward the west, and deep inside it something hides, waiting for passing ships. On the opposite side of the sea, a whirlpool swallowed the water and spewed it back out. Odysseus's ship had to pass straight between these two dangers.

Circe had already told him what lived in this strait, and even how many men Scylla would snatch each time a ship passed. Her only advice was not to fight back, but to row past as quickly as possible.

The Picture Circe Drew of Scylla

When Odysseus asked about the next leg of the route, Circe described the being living on one side of the strait in great detail. It had six necks, all extremely long, with a head at the end of each, and in each mouth three rows of densely packed teeth.

Its body was supported by twelve legs, all grotesquely twisted, she said, and she added that the sound it made was small and faint, like the yelping of a puppy—a voice utterly mismatched to its bulk.

The cave, she said, sat so high that even the finest archer could not reach it with an arrow. Crouched inside, whenever a ship passed, it would thrust all six heads down below the cliff at once and, as if fishing, snatch up one man in each mouth.

Six Men Are the Fixed Price; Delay Is a Greater Danger

Hearing Circe's description, Odysseus immediately asked how he could take up his weapons and fight. Circe, who knew his temperament well—always eager to battle something—told him flatly that this time he must abandon that temperament.

Circe had already warned that Scylla would snatch as many men as she had heads—six—each time a ship passed. And she made it clear that giving up six men was better than losing the entire crew to Charybdis.

At the same time, Circe issued one more warning. If he delayed before the cliff while putting on armor, Scylla might thrust out her heads once more and cost them six additional men. In other words, any loss beyond the fixed six would come only from stopping to fight on the spot. The only remedy Circe offered was not to arm and hold out, but to row past as fast as possible.

The Moment He Stood at the Bow in Armor

As the strait drew near, Odysseus put on his armor, took two long spears in hand, and went to stand at the bow. It was exactly the action Circe had told him not to do.

He did not tell his crew what precisely awaited by the cliff. He judged that if they were frightened in advance, their rowing hands might freeze and the ship could lose control. And so the ship, carrying crewmen who knew nothing and an Odysseus who knew yet could not lay down his arms, entered the strait.

While Eyes Turned to Charybdis, Scylla Struck

When the ship reached the middle of the strait, the crew was seized with fear. On one side was Scylla; on the other, Charybdis, swallowing the sea and spewing it back out. Everyone's gaze was fixed on the whirlpool churning before their eyes.

At that very moment, while the men's attention was absorbed by Charybdis, Scylla swooped in from the opposite side. With her six heads she snatched up at once the six strongest sailors aboard. Though Odysseus stood at the bow with his spears, the cave was so high that those spears were never within reach in the first place.

He could see them flailing, their hands and feet dangling in the air far above their own heads, and even in that moment they called out Odysseus's name as they were dragged upward. Just as an angler casts a line, deceives a fish, and hauls it flapping onto a rock, so Scylla held the six gasping men at the mouth of her cave.

Odysseus himself said it was the most harrowing moment of all the voyages he had endured; the sight of his companions vanishing before his eyes, calling his name, remained vivid. And because it happened while all attention was on Charybdis, the ship passed through the strait without ever being caught in the whirlpool itself.

On Where Scylla Might Actually Be

On first hearing this story, one naturally wonders which sea today holds the strait where Scylla lived. Later tradition widely came to place the scene in the Strait of Messina between Italy and Sicily, but the text of the Odyssey itself never pins down a specific coordinate or place name. All the original leaves us is the geography of a cave in a high cliff and the whirlpool facing it; the connection to real geography is left to later tradition and scholarly theory.

Figures Leading into the Next Story

The whirlpool that threatened the entire ship from the opposite side at the very moment Scylla struck is covered in detail in the myth of Charybdis. Another danger of this strait's approach—the one that lured sailors with song—can be found in the myth of the Sirens.

The story of the one who warned of Scylla and Charybdis beforehand is covered in the Circe myth summary, and where this episode sits within Odysseus's overall journey home can be explored in the Odysseus journey map.