Unchanged by any teller — how the centuries since have seen Scylla.
The gallery
Minos and Scylla
Unknown, 17th century
A 17th-century etching illustrating the fatal infatuation at the heart of the Megarian tragedy: from the walls of her besieged city Scylla, daughter of King Nisus, becomes captivated by the Cretan king Minos, who has come by sea against Megara. The print captures the turning point of Ovid's tale (Metamorphoses 8) and Apollodorus' account (Bibliotheca 3.15.8) — the moment of forbidden love that drives the princess to shear the single purple lock on which her father's life and kingdom depend, betraying Megara to win a suitor who will ultimately spurn her.
Fresco of Scylla (from a villa at Tor Marancia, Rome)
Unknown, 3rd century CE
A Roman wall painting from a 3rd-century CE villa excavated at Tor Marancia, just south of Rome, part of a cycle portraying the tragic heroines of Greek drama. Here the figure identified as Scylla, daughter of Nisus, stands among these doomed protagonists — the Megarian princess whose love for Minos led her to pluck the purple lock from her sleeping father's head, dooming both her city and herself. The fresco preserves a rare ancient image of a figure who, despite her vivid literary afterlife in Ovid and Hyginus, was seldom represented in the visual arts.