Pol´ypheme (3 syl.), a gigantic cyclops of Sicily, who fed on human flesh. When Ulysses, on his return from Troy, was driven to this Island, he and twelve of his companions were seized by Polypheme, and confined in his cave, that he might devour two daily for his dinner. Ulysses made the giant drunk, and, when he lay down to sleep, bored out his one eye. Roused by the pain, the monster tried to catch his tormentors; but Ulysses and his surviving companions made their escape by clinging to the bellies of the sheep and rams when they were let out to pasture (Odyssey, ix.).
There is a Basque legend told of the giant Tartaro, who caught a young man in his snares, and confined him in his cave for dessert. When, however, Tartaro fell asleep, the young man made the giant’s spit red hot, bored out his one eye, and then made his escape by fixing the bell of the bell-ram round his neck, and a sheep-skin over his back. Tartaro seized the skin, and the man, leaving it behind, made off.—Basque Legends.
A very similar adventure forms the tale of Sindbad’s third voyage, in the Arabian Nights. He was shipwrecked on a strange island, and entered, with his companions, a sort of palace. At nightfall, a one-eyed giant entered, and ate one of them for supper, and another for breakfast next morning. This went on for a day or two, when Sindbad bored out the giant’s one eye with a charred olive stake. The giant tried in vain to catch his tormentors, but they ran to their rafts; and Sindbad, with two others, contrived to escape.
*** Homer was translated into Syriac by Theophilus Edessenes in the caliphate of Hárun-ur-Ráshid (A.D. 786-809).
Polypheme and Galatea. Polypheme loved Galatēa, the sea-nymph; but Galatea had fixed her affections on Acis, a Sicilian shepherd. The giant, in his jealousy, hurled a huge rock at his rival, and crushed him to death.
The tale of Polypheme is from Homer’s Odyssey, ix. It is also given by Ovid in his Metamorphoses, xiv. Euripidês introduces the monster in his Cyclops; and the tragedy of Acis and Galatea is the subject of Handel’s famous opera so called.
(In Greek the monster is called Polyphêmos, and in Latin Polyphēmus.)
Polyphe´mus of Literature, Dr. Samuel Johnson (1709-1784).
Polypho´nus (“big voiced”), the Kapăneus and most boastful of the frog heroes. He was slain by the mouse Artophăgus (“the bread-nibbler”).
But great Artophagus avenged the slain, ...
And Polyphōnus died, a frog renowned
For boastful speech and turbulence of sound.
Parnell, Battle of the Frogs and Mice, iii. (about 1712).