Charybdis is depicted as a monstrous entity hidden among the reefs

Описание: In Greek mythology, Charybdis was the daughter of the sea god Poseidon and the earth goddess Gaia. Poseidon already held a grudge against his younger brother, Zeus (the king of the gods). To help her father avenge this enmity, Charybdis submerged many islands and lands belonging to Zeus. The Lord of the Gods flew into a rage at Charybdis's audacious act, immediately capturing her and chaining her to the seabed.

Not yet appeased, Zeus further cursed Charybdis to transform into a disgusting 'bladder' of a sea monster, with her limbs resembling paddles. Three times a day, Charybdis would suck in the seawater to quench her ferocious thirst, then violently spew it out, creating deadly whirlpools.

Ships passing through the Strait of Messina, if they managed to avoid the Charybdis whirlpool on one side, were forced to confront the six-headed sea monster Scylla, as the two monsters lay opposite each other on a strait only a few kilometers wide. The English idiom, "Between Charybdis and Scylla," is equivalent in meaning to the Vietnamese saying, "tránh vỏ dưa gặp vỏ dừa" (out of the frying pan and into the fire/between a rock and a hard place).

According to Thomas Bulfinch, based on the works of Homer, Charybdis was the one who stole the cattle of Geryon from the god Hermes, and was punished by being transformed into a sea monster.

Scientists named a genus of crabs in the Order Decapoda Charybdis.