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Nov 27, 2009
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Dictionary of Phrase and Fable—C

Circe

(2 syl.). A sorceress. She lived in the island of Ææa. When Ulysses landed there, Circë turned his companions into swine, but Ulysses resisted this metamorphose by virtue of a herb called moly, given him by Mercury.

Who knows not Circe,
The daughter of the Sun, whose charmëd cup
Whoever tasted lost his upright shape,
And downward fell into a grovelling swine?

Milton: Comus, 50- 53.

Source: Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, E. Cobham Brewer, 1894
Circle of Ulloa
Cipher
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