Charybdis
The personified whirlpool in Homer’s Odyssey
The sea danger beneath a fig tree opposite Scylla, drawing water down and throwing it back up as Odysseus struggles to pass.
Quick answer
Charybdis is the named whirlpool opposite Scylla in Book XII of Homer’s Odyssey. Circe warns that she swallows and disgorges seawater three times each day. Odysseus passes her with his crew, then returns alone on wreckage and survives by clinging to a fig tree until his floating support reappears.[1][2][3]
Quick facts
| Record type | Named sea danger: personified whirlpool in Greek epic |
|---|---|
| Source | Homer, Odyssey, Book XII; Samuel Butler’s prose translation |
| Source realm | Greek mythic world: the lower rock opposite Scylla |
| Action in Circe’s warning | Three daily discharges and three intakes of seawater[1] |
| Visible effects | Roaring, swirling water, high spray, and an exposed dark bottom[2] |
| Bodily form | No separate anatomy described in this account |
| Escape on the return | Odysseus hangs from a fig tree and recovers his wreckage[3] |
What the source says
Circe’s warning
Circe describes two rocks within a bow-shot of each other. Beneath the lower rock’s leafy fig tree lies Charybdis. Circe warns Odysseus against being there during the inward rush: even the sea god, called Neptune by Butler, could not save him. She advises passing close to Scylla, accepting the loss of six men rather than risking the entire crew.[1]
The first passage
Odysseus describes water thrown up like a cauldron boiling over a fire, with spray reaching the rock tops. As the water draws down, it whirls noisily against the rocks and reveals sand and mud below. While the frightened crew watches Charybdis, Scylla snatches six men. The ship continues onward: Charybdis does not destroy it in this encounter.[2]
The return on wreckage
After the crew kills the Sun-god’s cattle, Zeus—Butler’s Jove—wrecks the ship with lightning. Odysseus binds the keel and mast together. A changed wind carries him back to Charybdis at sunrise while she draws down the sea. He catches the fig tree and hangs there, unable to find a foothold, until his support comes back out of the whirlpool. He drops beside it, climbs aboard, and paddles with his hands. He credits the father of gods and men with preventing Scylla from seeing him again.[3]
Description and action
Butler calls Charybdis a whirlpool and refers to her as “she.” This profile’s label personified whirlpool describes that presentation, not a biological category. Unlike the detailed account of Scylla’s heads and teeth, this passage describes Charybdis through moving water and its danger to sailors. It does not establish tentacles, jaws, a human body, or a measured size.[1][2]
The boiling cauldron is a comparison for the water’s movement, not proof of heat or fire. Circe’s threefold daily cycle is retained as her warning rather than converted into a modern tide schedule. This page retains Butler’s spelling Charybdis and uses Odysseus for the hero he calls Ulysses.[1][2]
Source realm: beneath the lower rock
Charybdis belongs to the dangerous sea route past Scylla on the way to the Sun-god’s island. The lower rock and its fig tree fix her position relative to Scylla’s high cave. This is the narrated geography; Butler’s notes identifying places around Sicily are not treated as locations explicitly named by Homer.[1][2]
The archive groups this record under Mythic cosmos and the Ancient Mediterranean cultural shelf.
Themes in the episode
Survival with a cost: Circe’s route offers passage at the price of companions lost to Scylla. Endurance: on his return, Odysseus survives by hanging on and waiting for the wreckage. These readings follow the episode’s choices and actions; they do not assign Charybdis a universal symbolic meaning.[1][3]
Books and references
- 1Homer, The Odyssey, Book XII: Circe’s warning
Rendered into English prose by Samuel Butler; first published 1900. Text consulted: Project Gutenberg eBook 1727, updated 1 December 2023, with Henry Festing Jones’s second-edition preface dated 4 December 1921. See the paragraph beginning “You will find the other rock” and Circe’s advice immediately following. Public-domain translation.
Read Book XII ↗ - 2Homer, Odyssey, Book XII: the first passage
Butler, same digital edition. See the paragraph beginning “Then we entered the Straits,” through Scylla’s attack and the arrival at the Sun-god’s island. The water’s cauldron-like movement and exposed bottom occur at the opening of this passage.
Read the first encounter ↗ - 3Homer, Odyssey, Book XII: shipwreck and return
Butler, same digital edition. See the shipwreck after the cattle episode and the bracketed passage beginning “The gale from the West,” ending with escape from Scylla’s sight. Consult Butler’s endnotes 101, 106, and 107 for his editorial qualifications. His conjectures remain distinct from the translated narrative.
Read the return episode and linked notes ↗ - 4William Bromley after Henry Fuseli, Odysseus Between Scylla and Charybdis (1806)
Engraving and etching for Pope’s Odyssey, proof before letters; British Museum provenance recorded on Wikimedia Commons. Image reference only. Commons marks the faithful reproduction PD-Art / public domain. Bromley died in 1842 and Fuseli in 1825; the print predates 1931.
Image provenance and rights ↗
