[Fred Nerks]

I have a relative by marriage, born on the island of Lipari who recalls the local oral legend of Ulysses and his visit to the Aeolian Islands, told to him by his illiterate grandmother when he was a child, (she also warned him if he didn't behave the Mamelukes would come and take him away) There still remains a whirlpool between Sicily and Scylla on the mainland, thus it's just possible the quest for the golden fleece (wasn't that how the Anatolians captured gold dust?) took place at a time of great tectonic upheaval manifested at both the Strait of Gibraltar and The Bosphorus...

Scylla and Charibdis

Charybdis, who lurked under a fig tree a bowshot away on the opposite shore, drank down and belched forth the waters thrice a day and was fatal to shipping. Her character was most likely the personification of a whirlpool. The shipwrecked Odysseus barely escaped her clutches by clinging to a tree until the improvised raft that she swallowed floated to the surface again after many hours. Scylla was often rationalized in antiquity as a rock or reef. Both gave poetic expression to the dangers confronting Greek mariners when they first ventured into the uncharted waters of the western Mediterranean. To be “between Scylla and Charybdis” means to be caught between two equally unpleasant alternatives.

[SunkenCiv]

Thanks FN!