Source-groundedThe Odyssey
All entities

Character · Individual

Charybdis

Published entity metadata

Read-only identity and editorial metadata.

Canonical name
Charybdis
Disambiguator
None
Kind
Character
Scope
Individual
Editorial note
Conservative character kind: Book 12 names and personifies Charybdis but does not explicitly call her a deity or monster.

Aliases

0

No aliases recorded.

Location presence

Phase 6 currently covers 24 processed books.

2
whirlpool of Charybdis2 observations
·Reported

Charybdis occupies the sucking whirlpool beneath the fig tree.

See evidence text
“‘‘You will find the other rock lie lower, but they are so close together that there is not more than a bow-shot between them. [A large fig tree in full leaf {101} grows upon it], and under it lies the sucking whirlpool of Charybdis. Three times in the day does she vomit forth her waters, and three times she sucks them down again; see that you be not there when she is sucking, for if you are, Neptune himself could not save you; you must hug the Scylla side and drive ship by as fast as you can, for you had better lose six men than your whole crew.’ ”
·Remembered

Charybdis sucked and discharged water in her whirlpool.

See evidence text
“‘Then we entered the Straits in great fear of mind, for on the one hand was Scylla, and on the other dread 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 wits ends for fear. While we were taken up with this, and were expecting each moment to be our last, 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. As a fisherman, seated, spear in hand, upon some jutting rock {104} throws bait into the water to deceive the poor little fishes, and spears them with the ox’s horn with which his spear is shod, throwing them gasping on to the land as he catches them one by one—even so did Scylla land these panting creatures on her rock and munch them up at the mouth of her den, while they screamed and stretched out their hands to me in their mortal agony. This was the most sickening sight that I saw throughout all my voyages. ”

Claims

4
·Reported

Charybdis lies beneath the fig tree, vomiting her waters three times daily and sucking them down three times.

See evidence text
“under it lies the sucking whirlpool of Charybdis. Three times in the day does she vomit forth her waters, and three times she sucks them down again”
·Remembered

Charybdis sucks and vomits the salt sea with deafening force, exposing a whirlpool bottom black with sand and mud.

See evidence text
“dread 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”
·Remembered

Charybdis sucks down the salt sea while Ulysses hangs above, then eventually discharges his mast-and-keel raft.

See evidence text
“the terrible whirlpool of Charybdis. This indeed was what actually happened, for I was borne along by the waves all night, and by sunrise had reached the rock of Scylla, and the whirlpool. She was then sucking down the salt sea water, {106} but I was carried aloft toward the fig tree, which I caught hold of and clung on to like a bat. I could not plant my feet anywhere so as to stand securely, for the roots were a long way off and the boughs that overshadowed the whole pool were too high, too vast, and too far apart for me to reach them; so I hung patiently on, waiting till the pool should discharge my mast and raft again—and a very long while it seemed. A jury-man is not more glad to get home to supper, after having been long detained in court by troublesome cases, than I was to see my raft beginning to work its way out of the whirlpool again”
·Remembered

Ulysses remembers Charybdis as terrible.

See evidence text
“went on to the wandering rocks and terrible Charybdis and to Scylla”

Additional evidence

Evidence records not already represented by a claim.

3
·Reported
“the sucking whirlpool of Charybdis”
·Remembered
“dread Charybdis kept sucking up the salt water”
·Remembered
“terrible Charybdis”

Passage preview

Book 12 · Passage 8

‘‘You will find the other rock lie lower, but they are so close together that there is not more than a bow-shot between them. [A large fig tree in full leaf {101} grows upon it], and under it lies the sucking whirlpool of Charybdis. Three times in the day does she vomit forth her waters, and three times she sucks them down again; see that you be not there when she is sucking, for if you are, Neptune himself could not save you; you must hug the Scylla side and drive ship by as fast as you can, for you had better lose six men than your whole crew.’