In Greek mythology, Scylla was a princess of Megara, the daughter of King Nisus. When Minos of Crete besieged Megara, she fell in love with him and betrayed her father by cutting the single purple lock of hair on which his life and the city's invincibility depended. Repelled by her treachery, Minos rejected her, and in the end Scylla was transformed into a seabird, forever pursued by her father, who became a sea eagle. She is distinct from the homonymous sea monster Scylla.
Adapted from Wikipedia, "Scylla (daughter of Nisus)" · CC BY-SA 4.0
I.Family
Scylla was the daughter of Nisus, King of Megara. Her mother was possibly Abrota, daughter of King Onchestus. She had two sisters, Eurynome and Iphinoe.
II.Mythology
According to the tale, Nisus possessed a single lock of purple hair which granted both him and the city of Megara invincibility. When Minos, the King of Crete, invaded Nisus's kingdom, Scylla saw him from the city's battlements and fell in love with him.
In order to win Minos's heart, she resolved to grant him victory in battle: she removed the protective lock from her father's head and presented it to Minos. Disgusted with her lack of filial devotion, Minos left her behind in the sacked ruins of Megara.
Accounts of her end vary. In some versions Scylla pursued the departing enemy; in others Minos bound her to the prow of his ship. Before drowning, Scylla was transformed into a seabird (ciris, perhaps an egret), relentlessly pursued by her father, who was himself transformed into a sea eagle (haliaeetus).
III.Parallels and cultural references
The story parallels that of Comaetho, daughter of Pterelaus, and similar tales are told of Pisidice, a princess of Methymna, and of Leucophrye. The story of al-Nadirah, recounted by al-Tabari and other early Islamic writers, was considered by Theodor Nöldeke to derive from Scylla's tale.
Scylla also appears in Alexander Pope's mock-heroic poem "The Rape of the Lock," invoked amid gallant chatter at a card table: "Ah cease, rash youth! desist ere 'tis too late, / Fear the just gods, and think of Scylla's fate!"