Polyphemus

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Polyphemus

Polyphemus , the gigantic one-eyed son of Poseidon

Poseidon

Thoosa

In Greek mythology, Thoosa or Tho?sa was a Nereids, and one of Poseidon's Wikt:paramour. She became mother of the Cyclops Polyphemus when Poseidon possessed her in a sea cave....
, is a character in Greek mythology

Greek mythology

Greek mythology is the body of myths and legends belonging to the Ancient Greece concerning their List of Greek mythological figures#Immortals and Greek hero cult, Cosmology#Metaphysical cosmology, and the origins and significance of their own cult and ritual practices....
, one of the Cyclops

Cyclops

In Greek mythology and later Roman mythology, a cyclops , is a member of a primordial race of giant , each with a single eye in the middle of its forehead....
. His name means "famous". Polyphemus plays a pivotal role in Homer

Homer

Homer is traditionally held to be the author of the ancient Greek language epic poems the Iliad and the Odyssey, as well as of the Homeric Hymns....
's Odyssey
Odyssey

The Odyssey is one of two major ancient Hellenic civilization epic poetrys attributed to Homer. It is, in part, a sequel to the Iliad, the other work traditionally ascribed to Homer....
.

a class="link1" onMouseover='showByLink("m1464791",this)' onMouseout='hide("m1464791")'href="http://www.absoluteastronomy.com/topics/Homer">Homer

Homer

Odysseus

Odysseus or Ulysses , in Greek mythology , was a legendary Greeks king of Ithaca and the hero of Homer's Epic poetry, the Odyssey. Odysseus also plays a key role in Homer's Iliad and other works in the Epic Cycle....
lands on the Island of the Cyclopes

Cyclops

In Greek mythology and later Roman mythology, a cyclops , is a member of a primordial race of giant , each with a single eye in the middle of its forehead....
during his journey home from the Trojan War

Trojan War

In Greek mythology, the Trojan War was waged against the city of Troy by the Achaeans after Paris of Troy stole Helen from her husband Menelaus, the king of Sparta....
. He then takes twelve men and sets out to find supplies. The Greeks find and enter a large cave, which happens to be the home of the great Cyclops Polyphemus

Polyphemus

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Polyphemus , the gigantic one-eyed son of Poseidon

Poseidon

Thoosa

Greek mythology

Cyclops

Homer

Polyphemus in Homer's Odyssey

In Homer

Homer

Odysseus

Cyclops

Trojan War

Polyphemus

Polyphemus , the gigantic one-eyed son of Poseidon and Thoosa, is a character in Greek mythology, one of the Cyclops. His name means "famous". Polyphemus plays a pivotal role in Homer's Odyssey....
. When Polyphemus returns home with his flocks and finds Odysseus and his men, he blocks the cave entrance with a great stone, trapping the remaining Greeks inside. The Cyclops then crushes and immediately devours two of his men. In the morning, he kills and eats two more. It is said that "rapping them on the ground, he knocked them dead like pups".

The desperate Odysseus devises a clever escape plan. That night, Polyphemus returns from herding his flock of sheep. He sits down and kills two more of Odysseus

Odysseus

Alcinous

Alcinous or Alk?no?s was in Greek mythology a son of Nausithous, or of Phaeax , and father of Nausicaa, Halius, and Laodamas with Arete ....
; to make Polyphemus unwary, Odysseus gives the Cyclops the very strong unwatered wine

Wine

Wine is an alcoholic beverage often made of fermentation grape juice. The natural chemical balance of grapes is such that they can ferment without the addition of sugars, acids, enzymes or other nutrients....
. When Polyphemus asks for Odysseus' name, Odysseus tells him "??t??," (translated as "no man"). Being drunk, Polyphemus thinks of it as a real name. Once the Cyclops passes out from the wine, Odysseus and his men take the giant's huge olive

Olive

The Olive is a species of small tree in the family Oleaceae, native to the coastal areas of the eastern Mediterranean region, from Lebanon, Syria and the maritime parts of Turkey and northern Iran at the south end of the Caspian Sea....
club that they sharpened to a point during that day, while he was away, and harden its tip in the embers of a fire. The men lift the stake and drive it into Polyphemus' eye, blinding him. Polyphemus yells for help from his fellow cyclopes that "no man" has hurt him. The other cyclopes take this to mean that Polyphemus has lost his mind, because he was saying "nobody" attacked him. They conclude his condition is a curse from a god, so they do not intervene.

In the morning, Odysseus and his men tie themselves to the undersides of Polyphemus' sheep

Domestic sheep

Domestic sheep are quadrupedal, ruminant mammals typically kept as livestock. Like all ruminants, sheep are members of the order Artiodactyla, the even-toed ungulates....
. When the blind Cyclops lets the sheep out to graze, he feels their backs to ensure the men aren't riding out, but doesn't feel the men underneath. Odysseus leaves last, riding beneath the belly of the biggest ram. Polyphemus doesn't realize that the men are no longer in his cave until the sheep (and men) are safely out.

As Odysseus and his men sail away, he boasts to Polyphemus that "Nobody didn't hurt you, Odysseus did!" This act of hubris

Hubris

Hubris or hybris , mythology is a term used in modern English to indicate overweening pride, superciliousness, or arrogance, often resulting in fatal retribution....
causes problems for Odysseus later. Polyphemus prays to his father, Poseidon

Poseidon

In Greek mythology, Poseidon was the god of the sea and, as "Earth-Shaker," of earthquakes. The name of the god Nethuns in Etruscan mythology was adopted in Latin for Neptune in Roman mythology: both were sea gods analogous to Poseidon....
fought on the side of the Greeks during the Iliad
ILiad

The iLiad is an electronic handheld device, or e-book device, which can be used for document reading and editing. Like the Sony Reader or Amazon Kindle, the iLiad makes use of an electronic paper display....
, he bore Odysseus a grudge for not giving him a sacrifice when Poseidon prevented them from being discovered inside of the Trojan Horse

Trojan Horse

The "Trojan Horse" refers to the stratagem that allowed the Greeks to finally enter the city of Troy during the Trojan War. In the best-known version of this Bronze Age story, after a fruitless 10-year siege of Troy, the Greeks built a huge figure of a horse, in which a select force of men hid....
. Poseidon curses Odysseus, sending storms and contrary winds to inhibit his homeward journey.

The episode in Odyssey is the oldest testament to cannibalism

Cannibalism

Cannibalism is the act or practice of humans eating other humans. The ritualistic eating of human flesh is also known as anthropophagy, from Greek: ?????p??, anthropos, "human being"; and fa?e??, phagein, "to eat"....
in ancient Greek literature

Ancient Greek literature

Ancient Greek literature refers to literature written in the Greek language until the 4th century AD....
. Walter Burkert

Walter Burkert

Walter Burkert , a scholar of Greek mythology and Cult , is an emeritus professor of classics at the University of Zurich, Switzerland, and also has taught in the United Kingdom and the United States....
detects in the Polyphemus episode a subtext that "seems to offer us something more ancient: threatened by the man-eater, men conceal themselves in the skins of slaughtered animals, and thus, disguised as animals, escape the groping hands of the blinded monster."

Polyphemus in Theocritus

The Hellenistic poet Theocritus

Theocritus

Theocritus , the creator of ancient Greek bucolic poetry, flourished in the 3rd century BC....
painted a more sympathetic picture of Polyphemus. The Cyclops of the Odyssey has been recast in the poet's bucolic style which idealized the simple farming life. Polyphemus becomes a gentle simpleminded shepherd in love with the sea-nymph Galatea

Galatea

Galatea is an ancient Greek name meaning "she who is milk-white", most notably referring to:* Galatea , one of three figures of classical myth:...
, finding solace in song.

Polyphemus in Ovid's Metamorphoses

The Cyclops also appears in the story of Acis

ACIS

The 3D ACIS Modeler is a 3D modelling kernel owned by Spatial Corp . ACIS is used by many software developers industries such as computer-aided design, , Computer-aided manufacturing , Computer-aided engineering , Architecture, engineering and construction , Coordinate-measuring machine , 3D animation, and shipbuilding....
and Galatea

Galatea

Galatea is an ancient Greek name meaning "she who is milk-white", most notably referring to:* Galatea , one of three figures of classical myth:...
. As a jealous suitor of the sea nymph

Nymph

In Greek mythology, a nymph is any member of a large class of mythological entities in human form. They were typically associated with a particular location or landform....
, Galatea

Galatea

Galatea is an ancient Greek name meaning "she who is milk-white", most notably referring to:* Galatea , one of three figures of classical myth:...
, he kills his rival Acis with a rock. Rather than telling the love stories of Odysseus

Odysseus

Aeneas

This article is about the Roman hero. For other uses, see Aeneas .In Greco-Roman mythology, Aeneas was a Troy hero, the son of prince Anchises and the goddess Venus_....
Ovid

Ovid

Publius Ovidius Naso was a Roman Empire poet known as Ovid to the English language-speaking world, who wrote about love, seduction, and Roman mythology transformation....
choses here to tell love stories about the monsters that those heroes experienced. Ovid's first century Roman audience would surely have had a basic knowledge of Polyphemus' role as an uncivilized cannibal in Book IX of the Odyssey, and this episode gives an amusing contrast to that characterization. Polyphemus is shown doing all of the things that a proper Roman suitor would do - trims his beard, composes a poem etc. - which implores the reader to cheer for him, even though his courtship is doomed to fail. Ovid tells this story shortly after the Judgement of Arms, where he shows how perceptions of Odysseus

Odysseus

Archaic period in Greece

The archaic period in Greece is a period of Ancient Greece history. The term originated in the 18th century and has been standard since. This term arose from the study of Greek art, where it refers to styles mainly of Decorative art and Plastic arts, falling in time between Geometric Art and the art of Classical Greece....
. Ovid appears to be suggesting in his uncharacteristic depiction of Polyphemus that it is possible for the way that readers view a character to drastically change over time.

Although the full story was described by Ovid, it was also mentioned by Philoxenus

Philoxenus

Philoxenus or Philoxenos is the name of several prominent ancient Greeks:*Philoxenus of Cythera, an ancient Greek dithyrambic poet*Philoxenus of Leucas, a legendary glutton...
and Theocritus

Theocritus

Theocritus , the creator of ancient Greek bucolic poetry, flourished in the 3rd century BC....
, and in Valerius Flaccus

Valerius Flaccus

Valerius Flaccus may refer to:*Gaius Valerius Flaccus, Roman poet at the time of Vespasian*Lucius Valerius Flaccus, name of a number of Roman politicians...
' version of Argonautica, among the themes painted on the Argos

Argos

Argos is a city in Greece in the Peloponnese near Nafplion, which was its historic harbour, named for Nauplius ....
, "Cyclops from the Sicilian shore calls Galatea back."

Other mythological figures

Additionally, one of the Argonauts

Argonauts

In Greek mythology, the Argonauts were a band of heroes who, in the years before the Trojan War, accompanied Jason to Colchis in his quest to find the Golden Fleece....
was named Polyphemus, "famous". He was the son of Elatus

Elatus

There were six figures named Elatus or ?latos in Greek mythology.* Elatus, a Lapiths chieftain, was the father, by Hippeia, of:**Ischys who was beloved by Coronis....
and Hippea

Hippeia

Hippeia or Hippea is the name of two characters in Greek mythology.Athena Hippeia Athena Hippeia is Athena as a goddess of horses....
, and when he helped Heracles

Heracles

In Greek mythology, Heracles or Herakles meaning "glory of Hera", or "Glorious through Hera" Alcides or Alcaeus " was a hero, the son of Zeus and Alcmene, foster son of Amphitryon and great-grandson of Perseus....
search for Hylas

Hylas

In Greek mythology, Hylas was the son of King Theiodamas of the Dryopians. Other sources such as Ovid state that Hylas' father was Heracles and his mother was the nymph Melite, or that his mother was the wife of Theiodamus, whose adulterous affair with Heracles caused the war between him and her husband....
, both were left behind by the Argo

Argo

In Greek mythology, the Argo was the ship on which Jason and the Argonauts sailed from Iolcus to retrieve the Golden Fleece....
. In Iliad I, Nestor

Nestor

Nestor may refer to:*Nestor , the son of Neleus, the King of Pylos and Chloris in Greek mythology*Nestor *Nestor , a genus of parrots in ornithology...
numbers "the godlike Polyphemus" among an earlier generation of heroes of his youth, "the strongest men that Earth has bred, the strongest men against the strongest enemies, a savage mountain-dwelling tribe whom they utterly destroyed." No trace of such an oral tradition, which Homer's listeners would have recognized in Nestor's allusion, survived in literary epic.

Cultural references

Polyphemus has been repeatedly portrayed in post-classical art and literature. Nicholas Poussin's painting Landscape with Polyphemus was the subject of a famous essay by William Hazlitt

William Hazlitt

William Hazlitt was an English writer remembered for his humanistic essays and literary criticism. Hazlitt was a prominent English literary critic, grammarian and philosopher....
.

In music, the story of Polyphemus and Galatea was the basis for Lully's Acis et Galatée
Acis et Galatée

Acis et Galat?e is an opera by Jean-Baptiste Lully. Unlike most of his operas, which are designated trag?dies en musique, Lully called this work a Pastorale h?ro?que, because it was on a pastoral theme and had only three acts compared to the usual five....
, Handel's Acis and Galatea
Acis and Galatea

Acis and Galatea is a musical work by George Frideric Handel with an English text by John Gay. The work has been variously described as a serenata, a masque, a pastoral or pastoral opera, a "little opera" , an entertainment and even an oratorio....
and Antonio de Literes

Antonio de Literes

Antonio de Literes was a Spain composer of zarzuelas, a type of performance that mixes spoken word, song and dance. Unlike Romantic opera, which is dominated by strings, there are guitars, lutes and harpsichords in the orchestra....
' zarzuela

Zarzuela

Zarzuela , is a Spanish lyric-dramatic genre that alternates between spoken and sung scenes, the latter incorporating operatic and popular song, as well as dance....
Acis y Galatea. Jean Cras

Jean Cras

Jean ?mile Paul Cras was a 20th century France composer and career naval officer. His musical compositions were inspired by his native Brittany, his travels to Africa, and most of all, by his sea voyages....
's opera Polyphème is also based on the story.

The Coen brothers

Coen Brothers

Joel Coen and Ethan Coen, known together professionally as the Coen brothers, are American filmmakers. For more than twenty years, the pair have written and directed numerous successful films, ranging from Screwball comedy film to hardboiled , to movies where genres blur together ....
' film "O Brother Where Art Thou?", is based on the Odyssey

Odyssey

The Odyssey is one of two major ancient Hellenic civilization epic poetrys attributed to Homer. It is, in part, a sequel to the Iliad, the other work traditionally ascribed to Homer....
, and John Goodman

John Goodman

John Stephen Goodman is a Golden Globe- and Emmy-winning United States actor. He is known for his deep, booming voice, and his large and robust size....
plays the eyepatch-wearing Big Dan Teague, a reinterpretation of Polyphemus.

The Radio Tales
Radio Tales

Radio Tales is an United States drama anthology radio series produced by Generations Productions LLC. This award-winning anthology series adapted classic works of American and world literature, and was a recipient of funding from the National Endowment for the Arts....
drama "Homer's Odyssey: Tale of the Cyclops" is a dramatic retelling of the portion of Homer's epic poem featuring the cyclops Polyphemus.

There have been several Royal Navy

Royal Navy

The Royal Navy of the United Kingdom is the oldest of the British Armed Forces . From the mid-18th century until well into the 20th century, it was the most powerful navy in the world, playing a key part in establishing the British Empire as the dominant world power from 1815 until the early 1940s....
ships with the name "Polyphemus" - see HMS Polyphemus

HMS Polyphemus

Three ships of the British Royal Navy have been named HMS Polyphemus, after the Polyphemus of Greek mythology.* The first HMS Polyphemus was a 64-gun third-rate launched in 1782, active in the Napoleonic Wars, converted to a powder hulk in 1813 and broken up in 1827....
.

Atlantic Horseshoe Crabs have the species name "polyphemus" in reference to their having eyes centered in the middle of their prosomas.

Symphonic Metal band Nightwish made a reference to the Cyclops in the song "Nemo" in the line "Nemo my name for evermore". The song refers to when the Cyclops asked Odysseus what his name was and Odysseus responded with “nemo” (roughly translated) to "nobody".

Thomas Wolfe's short story, "Polyphemus," centers around a one-eyed Spaniard who is blind to the true wealth around him as he searches the New World for gold.

Polyphemus

Polyphemus in Homer's Odyssey

Polyphemus in Theocritus

Polyphemus in Ovid's Metamorphoses

Other mythological figures

Cultural references

See also