Where Homer's sea-monster lurked — pastel fishing houses built on stone piers over the Strait of Messina, a clifftop Norman castle, and the finest swordfish in Italy eaten metres from the water
Scilla is a fishing village on the Calabrian shore of the Strait of Messina — the narrow channel between mainland Italy and Sicily that the ancient Greeks called the most dangerous passage in the sea. The lower fishing district of Chianalea is one of Italy's most photographed: pastel-painted houses built on stone piers directly over the water, accessible only by boat or narrow footpath, with traditional swordfish feluca boats moored at the door. The ancient swordfish-hunting tradition using tall-mast feluca boats to spot fish from height is still practised here.
The mythological Scylla of Homer's Odyssey — the six-headed monster devouring sailors from a clifftop cave on one side of the strait, with the whirlpool Charybdis on the other — is located by ancient sources at this promontory. The town grew around the Greek fortification, reinforced by Norman, Angevin, and Aragonese rulers. The Ruffo Castle on the high promontory has been a fortress since at least the 8th century. Scilla was near the epicentre of the catastrophic 1908 Messina earthquake, which generated a tsunami that swept Chianalea's seafront.