The Odyssey
This depicts Odysseus and a few of his men stabbing Polyphemus' eye.
Odysseus (Ulysses)- The son of Laertes, ruler of the island of Ithaca. The husband of the faithful  queen Penelope and father of Prince Telemachus. He is renowned for his brain as well as his brawn. Throughout the story, we learn a lot about Odysseus and his traits. He is very smart and cunning, but he has one almost fatal flaw, his hubris. Hubris is arrogance and overbearing pride when mortals assume that it is their own deeds, rather than the will of the gods, that determine the events of the world. 

Penelope- Odysseus' faithful wife.She hasn't seen Odysseus in twenty years but still resists the pressure to remarry. She never says outright that she won't marry again, but she puts it off in a more subtle way. She says she won't remarry until a burial, which certainly buys her time. These examples not only show her cleverness, but her faithfulness and her steadfastness to her beliefs.

Telemachus-  The prince of Ithaca, son of Odysseus. He was an infant when Odysseus left, but when he comes back at the end of the epic, he has grown into a young man. He is a very determined and strong-willed person, as shown in his journey to find his father. 

Athena- The Goddess of wisdom and battle. She helps out Odysseus when he is in tough situations. She prefers though to not become too involved, but rather watch him win. She also helps Telemachus. She convinces her dad, Zeus, to help Odysseus with Calypso. This shows she is sympathetic to Odysseus' plight and watches over him as his journey continues.

Poseidon- God of the sea, brother of Zeus. He is Odysseus' enemy. Poseidon caused many of Odysseus' hardships on his journey home. He made the currents and winds take Odysseus off course and used the seas to swamp their boats. He had monsters lash out at him as well. 

Zeus- King of the gods; god of thunder and lightning. He only appears in the epic a few times, when other gods ask him permission for things. Athena asks him to help Odysseus when he's on Calypso's island. It seems as if he doesn't get too involved with anything, just making sure everything maintains some sort of order.

Polyphemus- son of Poseidon. Polyphemus is a Cyclops, a grotesque giant with one grisly eye, who lives alone on the island of Sicily. Polyphemus is not very bright, however he is very strong. Cyclopes have general disregard for laws, and no hospitality. They see humans as food that are gifts from the Gods. Polyphemus is visited by Odysseus and his men. Polyphemus traps them in his cave, but Odysseus drives a stake through Polyphemus' eye so he is left blind.

Calypso- A beautiful nymph goddess, daughter of the Titan Atlas. She lives on the island of Ogygia, Odysseus resides there for 7 years. She wants to make him her immortal husband. Her allure is very strong to have Odysseus stay for so long. She obviously cares about Odysseus because in the end she did let him go when she saw him weeping for his homeland.

Scylla-Daughter of Crataeis. Dwelled by Charybdis, a ship eating whirlpool, somewhere by Sicily, Italy. An awful sea monster with 6 terrifying heads, necks and mouths. Her mouths were equipped with three rows of exceptionally sharp teeth. She has a repulsive yelp, similar to that of a dog's. She would take 6 men from every ship, one for each head. 

Charybdis-  On the left of Scylla there was Charybdis, another sea monster, who sucked all that came near it's gulf, which no ship could survive. It was like a boiling whirlpool. It swallowed the sea three times a day, and three times a day it spit the water back up. 
     These two monsters were on the left (Charybdis) and on the right (Scylla) of two high black rocks. The passageway was so narrow that sailors couldn't avoid one without encountering the other. Circe warns Odysseus about them and advised him to go closer to Scylla than Charybdis, for "it is better to lose six men than that all should drown." (Russel 210)

Circe-  Minor Goddess of magic. (Also known as a nymph). Daughter of Helios, the sun god. With the use of drugs and herbs, she transformed humans who came to her palace into various animals, who then roamed around her island. She turned Odysseus' whole crew into pigs.
     Circe gives Odysseus information about some of the monsters he will encounter on his voyage back to Ithaca. She warns him about Scylla and Charybdis. She also forewarns him about the cattle of the sun god.