Proper noun
Charybdis
- A dangerous whirlpool on the coast of Sicily opposite Scylla on the Italian coast.
1837, L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], “Chapter XII. Lady Marchmont’s Journal.”, in Ethel Churchill: Or, The Two Brides. […], volume III, London: Henry Colburn, […], →OCLC, page 85:I have never yet been able to steer my lovers through the Scylla of presence, or the Charybdis of absence.
- (Greek mythology) A personification of the above whirlpool as a female monster.
- Any dangerous whirlpool.
1638, Sir Thomas Herbert, Some yeares travels into divers parts of Asia and Afrique:…that night, wee ſailed merrily by the Maſcarenas, a Charybdis in 21 degrees, var.13 and 17 minutes…
1832, James Bell, A system of geography, popular and scientific:The tide here sets in alternately from N. to S. and from S. to N., which causes the whirlpool of Galofaro, the Charybdis of the ancients.
- 1842 Schiller, Friedrich poem Der Taucher (written in 1797) published in English in Blackwood's Magazine volume 52
- Lo! the wave that for ever devours the wave / Casts roaringly up the charybdis again…
Translations
Greek mythological monster
Proper noun
Charybdis f sg (genitive Charybdis); third declension
- Charybdis
Declension
Third-declension noun (i-stem, accusative singular in -im or -in, ablative singular in -ī), singular only.
More information singular, nominative ...
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References
- “Charybdis”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
- “Charybdis”, in William Smith, editor (1854, 1857), A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography, volume 1 & 2, London: Walton and Maberly
- Charybdis in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.
- Charybdis in Georges, Karl Ernst, Georges, Heinrich (1913–1918) Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th edition, volume 1, Hahnsche Buchhandlung