Scylla, enchanting village between history and myth
A legendary place recounted by classical writers and Grand Tour travelers, famous for its swordfish tradition, and now a seaside resort
Where
What is and where is Scylla
Scilla is a town of remote foundation on the promontory that juts out from the Calabrian coast at the entrance to the Strait of Messina. It has the Ruffo castle in the center and two picturesque seaside districts, Chianalea to the east and Marina Grande to the west. On the ridge, the Mother Church of the Annunziata, and then the high quarter of San Giorgio, facing inland in the presence of Aspromonte. Scylla owes its centuries-old commercial fortunes to its location, but also its sad name as a fatal place for ancient sailors caught unawares by the Strait currents. "And in the meantime Scylla seized me from the bottom of the ship six companions, who were the best in strength of arms," so Ulysses recounts in the 12th chapter of the Odyssey.
Scylla and Ovid's Metamorphoses.
Giving an account of it in a mythological key is Ovid in his Metamorphoses. Scylla is a beautiful sea nymph who becomes embroiled in one of those tantrums typical of Greek gods. Glaucus, a sea god rejected by her, in fact turns to the sorceress Circe for satisfaction for the offense. And the sorceress, who was jealous of Glaucus, sees fit to transform the poor girl into a monster half woman and half fish with six voracious dog heads as appendages; and so she ended up banished to the bottom of a cave, condemned to prey on the unfortunate passers-by. A harrowing transformation, effectively rendered in the bronze of a contemporary sculpture that the city has placed on the San Rocco lookout.
Scylla, the Grand Tour and an irresistible charm
The myth of Scylla is also at the origin of the tourist fortunes of the place since the days of the Grand Tour, when people crossed the Alps to visit the Bel Paese, having Rome, the Eternal City, as their destination. Only the most enterprising, from Goethe to Dumas, would extend the journey to Sicily. Among the must-see destinations, if only as a place of passage, was Scylla, precisely because it was inextricably linked to the popular figure of Ulysses. Testifying to this, between the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, a zstrong>varied production of vedutistica with a romantic imprint. The charm of the place, however, would also bewitch an artist much closer to us, the Dutchman Maurits Hescher, who in 1931 portrayed Chianalea and Marina Grande with a stroke that foreshadowed the hypnotic style of his most famous works.
Not to be missed: swordfish, a gastronomic specialty and local tradition
In more recent times over myth has prevailed admiration for another aspect of Scylla's history, swordfish fishing, a unique reality, as unique is the nature of the strait that sees its exercise. From spring to autumn, in fact, when this formidable pelagic fish crosses into these waters, theswift boats of the Scillese fishermen take to the sea, once by force of arms alone, engaging in an epic harpoon fight that has inspired poets and storytellers. The most interesting testimony, however, is that of filmmaker Vittorio De Seta, who in 1954 fixed the rituals of gestures and words of a fishery that today, however faithful to tradition in substance, has lost its oldest polish. As consolation, what those fishermen could never have imagined: the gastronomic exploit that has made swordfish Scylla's ambassador to the world.
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