In Homer’s Odyssey the Cyclopes are not described as three individuals but as a whole people. However, they shared the same basic characteristics of Hesiod’s Cyclopes and were an impossibly unruly group of beings. Their immediate neighbors were the Phaeacians, who were peaceful, inwardlooking, and culturally advanced. Although the Cyclopes were related to the Phaeacians, the Phaeacians uprooted and moved away to escape their bullying behavior.
One Cyclops, in particular, has become particularly well-known. The Odyssey describes the adventures of Odysseus, (also known as Ulysses), king of Ithaca, on his 10-year journey home from Troy at the end of the Trojan War. His travels through various fantastic realms bring him to a lush region full of potential—ideal for agriculture, pasturing flocks, growing vines, and shipping. The land is inhabited by Cyclopes, giant shepherds who live in small, isolated,
Above: This dramatic fresco, The Blinding of Polyphemus, was painted in 1580 by Alessandro Allori (1535—1607). It depicts the scene in the Odyssey where Odysseus and his men blind the Cyclops with a stake.
Family groups in caves high up in the mountains. They have no form of community or any social institutions, and they rely on the natural bounty of the land to provide for them without cultivation.
Odysseus and his men encounter a Cyclops named Polyphemus, a son of Poseidon, god of the sea. (Poseidon was a frequent procreator of monsters and unruly beings.) Polyphemus was as tall as a mountain peak, completely lawless, and without heed for Zeus or any other gods. Odysseus and his men become trapped inside the Cyclops’ cave when Polyphemus returns home and blocks the opening with a gigantic boulder. Their visit becomes a cruel travesty of the Greek code of hospitality, as Polyphemus begins eating his guests instead of offering them food. His guest-gift to Odysseus is the promise of being eaten last.
Like the Cyclops, Odysseus inverts the hospitality code, using it as a weapon against the uncivilized giant. When Polyphemus asks Odysseus his name, the Greek hero declares that it is Nobody (Outis). He then offers Polyphemus a “counter-gift” of wine with the aim of reducing him to a drunken stupor. The Cyclops drinks the wine neat, rather than mixed with water, as was the civilized Greek custom. When he lies unconscious, in a drunken stupor, Odysseus and his remaining men put out his one eye with a wooden stake they have sharpened. The blind Cyclops calls out to his fellow Cyclopes for help, but when they come to his cave to ask what is wrong, he says that “Nobody is killing me.” The other Cyclopes leave, assuming that Polyphemus is deranged. In the morning he has to roll back the boulder to let his sheep out of the cave to graze. Odysseus and his men tie themselves to the underside of rams from the Cyclops’ flock and escape.
The story finishes with a moral twist. Odysseus is unable to refrain from boasting as he escapes, and he tells the Cyclops his true name. This enables Polyphemus to appeal to his father Poseidon for revenge. The Cyclops’ curse condemns Odysseus to years of wandering and troubles, pursued by the sea god: “May Odysseus either never reach home, or, if he is to return to Ithaca, may he come home late, in bad shape, after losing all his companions, in a foreign ship and to trouble at home.” This curse is the primary cause of the long delay in Odysseus’s return home.
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