Extract

Powerful sorceress of mythology, daughter of *Helios and the Oceanid Perse (Hom.Od. 10. 135–9). *Homer places her island of Aeaea at the extreme east of the world (Od. 12. 3–4), but as early as *Hesiod, Theog. 1011–16 she is associated also with the west and frequently placed at Monte Circeo (see circeii) on the coast of *Latium (so *Apollonius (1) of Rhodes and *Virgil; cf. Hunter on Ap. Rhod. Arg. 3. 311–13). In the Odyssey, Circe transforms a group of *Odysseus' men into pigs (though they retain human intelligence); Odysseus rescues them by resisting the goddess’ magic, thanks to the power of the plant ‘moly’ which *Hermes gives him. Odysseus and his men stay with her for a year, after which she dispatches them to the Underworld to consult *Tiresias. On their return she gives them more detailed instructions as to how to confront the perils of the homeward journey. In the cyclic Telegonia (see epic cycle), her son by Odysseus, Telegonus, accidentally killed his father when raiding Ithaca, and she herself married *Telemachus (cf.