Monster · Character in Homer’s Odyssey
Charybdis
Whirlpool that swallows the sea
Appetite without a face; swallows on schedule, gives back wreckage.
The gulf facing Scylla across the narrows, sucking the water down and spewing it back three times a day. Odysseus passes her twice, the second time hanging from a fig tree above her until she coughs up the wreckage he needs.
Bonds
- Charybdis persecutes Odysseus — sucks down his raft; he clings to the fig tree
Appears in
- Book XII The Sirens, Scylla, and Charybdis
Scenes
- Sirens, Scylla, Charybdis — Book XII. Circè describes Sirens, Scylla, Charybdis
- Circè’s Final Warnings — Book XII. Circè warns to spare Helios’ cattle
- Scylla Seizes Six — Book XII. Scylla snatches six, devours them screaming
- Sighting Thrinacia — Book XII. Odysseus urges crew past lowing herds
- Adrift to Calypso — Book XII. Odysseus escapes Charybdis, drifts to Calypso
- Night of Shared Tales — Book XXIII. Penelope, Odysseus share their tales