The Hamlet Podcast

A

Agrippina (the Younger)
Daughter of Germanicus, and younger sister of Caligula, Agrippina Minor (Agrippina the Younger) was born on November 6, 15 and died on March 23, 59. She was one of the most prominent and successful women of the Julio-Claudian dynasty, and was the sister, wife and mother of three successive emperors. She was a particularly difficult mother, and was heavily involved in her son Nero’s succession to the imperial throne - although her heavy-handed involvement in his affairs led to her murder at his hands five years into his reign. She has been immortalised in plays, novels, television programmes and even a terrific baroque opera by Handel.

Alchemy
Alchemy is (or was) the attempt, via scientific processes, to improve or perfect something. Most frequently the aim was to turn something ordinary into gold. More specifically - and useful to us - was the process of converting a 'base metal' into a 'noble metal'. The noble metals are those substances that resist oxidisation or corrosion - particularly gold, silver, platinum, palladium and so on. (The metals that are worth making into jewellery or currency, since they will survive!) Hamlet's reference to the 'noble substance' is, we can reasonably assume, to gold. 

Amleth (Also written as Amlethus, or, in Icelandic, Amlóði) is a figure from Scandinavian legend, and is the foundational myth that led to Shakespeare’s version of the story in Hamlet.  The main source for the legend of Amleth is Saxo Grammaticus, who writes the story in his 13h century work, the Acts of the Danes - or Gesta Danorum.

An
Often in Shakespeare, an is used instead of “if”. “An thou hadst not come to my bed” is a clear example.

Anchor(ite)
According to Wikipedia, an anchorite (female: anchoress) is someone who “for religious reasons, withdraws from secular society so as to be able to lead an intensely prayer-oriented, ascetic, or Eucharist-focused life.” It comes from the Greek ἀναχωρητής, anachoritis, "one who has retired from the world". They were at their most significant numbers during the 13th century, and again such a mention within this play-within-the-play harks back to an older, Catholic world.

Angels
We will have much to discuss about Angels in this play - not least their final mention, which appears in one of my very favourite lines Shakespeare ever wrote. Hamlet was written at a liminal moment - the new faith of the Protestant Church of England was still only a generation old. Indeed it had come about in order to facilitate the union of Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn, whose only child, Elizabeth I, was head of the Church. Praying for the intercession of angels - or indeed their protection is a particularly Catholic thing, with which perhaps Shakespeare himself may have grown up. Hamlet's call to "angels and ministers of grace" makes him sound distinctly Catholic, and would not have gone unnoticed. He, Claudius and later Horatio all refer to angels throughout the play. The later reference to cherubs - a particular kind of angel responsible for looking over mankind - seems almost like a reminder to Claudius that the old regime - whether that of Old Hamlet or indeed of catholicism in Shakespeare’s England - hasn’t entirely been forgotten, and there will be a reckoning eventually.

Queen Anne of Denmark
(12 December 1574 - 2 March 1619)
Anne was born on 12 December 1574 at the castle of Skanderborg on the Jutland Peninsula in Denmark. She spent her earliest years in Germany, but grew up mostly in Denmark. She was married to James VI of Scotland at the age of fourteen. En route to Scotland, her ship was stranded in Norway, and the king himself sailed to Norway, where their marriage was celebrated on 23 November 1589.
Anne was rather tall - taller than her husband, indeed - and was a fan of dancing and performing. She went on to appear in numerous masques by Ben Johnson, among them The Masque of Beauty. Several of her children with James did not survive into adulthood, and eventually the royal couple grew apart. Anne lived in Somerset House - which she renamed Denmark House - and was a great patroness of the arts. She died in 1619. She was buried in Westminster Abbey, but the catafalque covering her resting place was destroyed during the upheavals against her son, Charles I.

Antithesis
As mentioned in this episode, antithesis is one of the central keys to unlocking Shakespeare’s language. Simply put, it’s a word or group of words set against its opposite. The contrast between the two juxtaposed ideas - the antithesis - enriches the imagery and depth of thought. The actor must play the antithesis in order to highlight the meaning of the text. Some recognisable examples of antithesis in Shakespeare are:

To be, or not to be. . .
Fair is foul, and foul is fair. . .
What he has lost, noble Macbeth has won. . .

Apes and Apples
The image of the ape holding its food in the corner of its mouth is, for my money, stronger than the idea of the apple, and certainly better than the image conjured by editors trying to join the ape AND the apple…!

Arden Shakespeare
The Arden Shakespeare is perhaps my favourite imprint - always has been. The third edition is reaching its final volumes, and indeed the editors for the fourth edition have already been selected. There have been numerous Hamlet publications from the third edition, but the revised text by Ann Thompson and Neil Taylor is available here. It’s one of many editions that I use for the podcast, but it is certainly one of the best.

Arras
Arras is a town in northern France famous for its tapestries. Its reputation for fine such artworks dates back at least to the 14th century, and indeed the reputation grew so great that the name of the town became synonymous with beautiful hanging tapestries.

Asides
I don't think it's really necessary to explain what an aside is, obviously, but I didn't quite manage to put into the main text of the episode the fact that sometimes in performance this first aside from Hamlet isn't actually played as one. If Hamlet says it directly to Claudius, it's even more startling as a first line, and indeed it necessitates even more handling from Gertrude. The play has an infinity of possibilities! 

Astrology
Elizabeth I had her own court astrologer, and interest in the field obviously trickled down throughout her kingdom. Some have argued that Shakespeare even based the character of Prospero in The Tempest on this astrologer, John Dee. There are astrological references throughout the plays. The signs of the Zodiac crop up quite frequently, and the Planets are often said to wield influence over certain characters. Mars governs Monsieur Parolles in All's Well That Ends Well, and Jupiter is very favourably disposed to Posthumous in Cymbeline. The world was moving from a geocentric to a heliocentric view of the universe at the time Shakespeare was writing, and a shift was happening, naturally, in the way that people studied the heavenly bodies. Here is the article I mentioned in Episode 48 - an extensive discussion of Astronomy in Hamlet. 

Astronomy
Early in the play there are references to stars and cosmic events and (perhaps) the trials of European astronomers who were trying to prove that the earth was round and not flat. Shakespeare’s theatre was called The Globe, and so we can maybe assume that he was aware that the planet is not a disc. In this little segment of the text it’s fascinating that he combines the imagery of the ancient world (Phoebus, Neptune, Tellus) with the idea of the sun going around the earth over the course of the year. Obviously this is easy to overlook, but it’s an intriguing idea.

B

Bakers’ Daughters
There are very few bakers in all of Shakespeare. Bakers’ wives get a mention in Henry IV, and the baker’s daughter shows up in Hamlet. In both cases, the speaker is likely referring to prostitutes. The association seems to go back at least as far as ancient Rome, where “the alicariae, or [female] bakers, were women of the street who waited for fortune at the doors of bakeries, especially those which sold certain cakes destined for offerings to Venus. On certain festivals, the master bakers sold nothing but sacrificial breads, and at the same time they had slave girls or servant maids who prostituted themselves day and night in the bakery.” (This text comes from the extravagant, six-volume History of Prostitution by Paul Lacroix, written in the 1850s.)

Basilisk
I got a little carried away mentioning the basilisk, the mythical serpent ('king' of snakes) that is so dangerous it can kill you by looking at you. The creature shows up in literature from the works of Venerable Bede to the Canterbury Tales, and from Leonardo da Vinci all the way to Harry Potter! There are numerous references to the basilisk in Shakespeare also, invariably to do with this lethal gaze. 

Bear-baiting remained popular in England until the 19th century. Attached with the notes for Episode 124 is an engraving from the late 16th or early 17th century showing “the bear garden” somewhere on the south bank of the Thames in London - you could be forgiven for thinking it was a picture of the Globe!

Bevor
While googling images for this particular piece of armour the surprising thing was how many Renaissance Fayre- style reconstructions showed up. Armour continues to fascinate, it seems - and I am sure there are passionate folks out there who might argue that Shakespeare was wrong to describe the folding visor of a helmet as the bevor, since for some the bevor was specifically a neck-covering plate of armour. As ever, it is safest to assume a) that Shakespeare does know what he is talking about, and b) that it's the effect of the image that is important, rather than specifics. 

Birdlime
Around the world there are several versions of birdlime, a sticky substance concocted to spread out as a trap to catch birds. A popular European recipe is made from holly bark, boiled and reduced until it forms a sticky paste. Claudius’ vivid image is of a bird trapped in lime - the more the bird attempts to free itself, the more it becomes ensnared in the claggy mess.

The Book of Common Prayer
Originally published in 1549 , The Book of Common Prayer was a major project of the English Reformation - the first publication ever to include all of the prayers and offices of religious service in English. It is still a key part of Protestant worship all over the world. Within it was a catechism, which is an introduction of the terms of religious doctrine. The catechism would be learned by rote, and was written as a series of questions. The segment that Hamlet is quoting is an explanation of the meaning of the 8th Commandent, “thou shalt not steal”. After the explanation of each commandment’s teaching, there came a sequence of questions and specific quotations from the Bible that were used to back up each text. For our segment the question is “How do you prove it your duty to keep your hands from picking and stealing?” The answers come from Ephesians iv. 28 “Let him that stole steal no more”, and Thessalonians iv. 6 “That no man go beyond and defraud his brother in any matter”. Horatio probably understands all of this but it seems that the reference is utterly lost on Rosencrantz and Guildenstern.

Books
Harold Bloom - Hamlet: Poem Unlimited (here)
J. Dover Wilson - What Happens in Hamlet (here)
Michael Srigley - Hamlet, The Law of Writ, and the Universities (here)

Botany
Laertes finishes his speech to Ophelia with quite an involved set of botanical images - cankers, dews and contagious blastments all besetting the 'infants of the spring'. It's worth always bearing in mind that Shakespeare grew up in the country, and was deeply aware of the life of the seasons. No surprise that there are enough botanical references in Shakespeare to fill a book - and a lovely one, too - Gerit Quealey has put together "An Illustrated Compendium of All the Flowers, Fruits, Herbs, Trees, Seeds, and Grasses Cited" - you can find it here.

Tycho Brahe
Tycho Brahe was a Danish astronomer, noted as much for developing many fine astronomical instruments as for his near-accurate positioning of stars without the aid of telescope. He was born in the sixteenth century to a powerful noble family of Denmark. Although he was groomed for a career in the civil service, his interest turned to astronomy, and later even to alchemy. He built laboratories and observatories on the family property, and eventually discovered a new star on 11 November 1572. He eventually published a paper on the star the following year, becoming the then equivalent of an overnight sensation. (The paper is called "On the New Star".) Subsequently, thanks to the royal patronage, he built two fine observatories at Hven, where he continued with his astronomical studies, until circumstances forced him to go into exile. He spent the last years of his life at the Imperial Court of Holy Roman Emperor Rudolf II, occupying the position of Imperial Mathematician and Astrologer.

Branagh’s Hamlet
As I mentioned at the end of episode 67, Kenneth Branagh went all-out in his film version of the play in 1996. He filmed the entire play, with a fabulous cast that includes Brian Blessed, Derek Jacobi, Julie Christie and Kate Winslet. He also includes a good few flashbacks and extra scenes, including those described at Troy by the First Player. Here’s the full speech, performed by Charlton Heston and with John Gielgud and Judi Dench as Priam and Hecuba.

Branding
Branding was suggested as a punishment for harlotry by Henry VIII in 1513, but does not appear to have been put into practice. Branding was used throughout as a punishment (or rather an indicator) for people who had committed various crimes - often people were branded with a letter that explained what they had done. Slaves were also frequently branded. It is a particularly grim abuse of any human, marking their body for life either as criminals or as the supposed property of another person. For Hamlet even to intimate that his mother deserves to have her forehead branded is an especially violent image. Foreheads appear throughout this sequence as an indicator of a person’s character.

Brevity
Tony Church wrote a brilliant contribution to the first of the six excellent "Players of Shakespeare" books from Cambridge University Press. In his essay on playing Polonius, he discusses a genius move in rehearsals for the play, in which the company changed the alcohol being consumed in the Danish court. They moved from wine to harder liquor (aquavit, appropriate to the Scandinavian setting) - immediately Polonius' verbosity became a bravura performance at dizzying speed, in which he could deliver twice the text anyone else might speak in the same amount of time. In this staging, Polonius could show a different awareness of his overblown language - and these earlier scenes displayed rather more humour. 

Peter Brook's play Qui Est Là takes its name from the opening line of Hamlet, but features other texts by several great writers and theorists of the theatre from all over the world. He directed two major productions of Hamlet - one in 1955 with Paul Schofield, and another in 2000 with Adrian Lester. 

Giordano Bruno
It's a little bit of a stretch to infer that Shakespeare is acknowledging that Earth's sun is a star in the reference to 'disasters of the sun' - since it was a very long time before science accepted the idea. Giordano Bruno was a Dominican friar who was also a philosopher, mathematician and astronomer, who posited the theory that we are not the centre of everything, and that there are conceivably multiple stars with planets in their orbits in the infinite universe. For these ideas (and for his rejection of several church doctrines) he was burned at the stake in Rome's Campo de' Fiori in 1600. He is considered an early martyr for science and free thought. 

Brutus - The noblest Roman of them all
Despite the fact that he organises the assassination of Julius Caesar (and so famously strikes the final blow) Brutus is eulogised very beautifully in Shakespeare's version of the story. His nobility is mentioned in Marc Antony's final comments, as well as the segment mentioned in this episode: 

This was the noblest Roman of them all:
All the conspirators save only he, 
Did that they did in envy of great Caesar;  
He only, in a general honest thought  
And common good to all, made one of them.  
His life was gentle, and the elements
So mix'd in him that Nature might stand up
And say to all the world 'This was a man!' 

(Julius Caesar, Act 5 Scene 5)

Richard Burbage
Click here to listen to the Bonus Episode about Richard Burbage, the original interpreter of Hamlet.

Burial
When I started to write a note about burial customs and their significance in the play, I wound up re-recording Episode 28 entirely! So, not much more to say than is now included in the podcast. But for a brief discussion of the differences between burial customs in Shakespeare's time and our own, click here. 

C

Caesura
A caesura is a pause or break in a metrical line of poetry. It is frequently suggested by a punctuation mark or the end of a phrase. The caesura is a longstanding feature of rhythmic poetry, very common across multiple languages. They appear throughout Shakespeare, Beowulf, and as far back as Latin and even Ancient Greek. The first lines of two of the greatest classics, The Iliad and The Aeneid, both have notable caesurae in their opening lines. (Indeed, Virgil’s opening line echoes Homer’s - and there’s every chance Shakespeare was emulating both in the opening line of HIS war epic, Henry V…!)

Homer: The Iliad
μῆνιν ἄειδε θεὰ <caesura> Πηληϊάδεω Ἀχιλῆος
(Sing, Goddess, of the rage of Achilles, son of Peleus…)

Virgil: The Aeneid
Arma virumque cano <caesura> Troiae qui primus ab oris
(Of arms and the man, I sing. || Who first from the shores of Troy...)

Shakespeare: Henry V
O for a muse of fire, <caesura> that would ascend…

Cain and Abel
In the book of Genesis in the Bible, Cain and Abel are the sons of Adam and Eve. Cain was a farmer, Abel a shepherd. When both brothers made sacrifices to God, He preferred Abel's offering, and Cain killed him. This was the first murder, and Abel, therefore, the 'first corpse' mentioned in this episode's portion of the text. Cain was thereafter punished with a lifetime of wandering, and with 'the mark of Cain', a sign from God that prevented anyone from killing him - perhaps as a warning not to commit his sin again. 

Cap-a-pe
Variously rendered as cap-a-pe or cap-a-pie, this phrase comes from medieval French, and means head to foot. (It can be traced even further back to Latin, where caput = head and pedem = food. Cap a pe, indeed.) 

Carmina Burana
I mention this in the glossary/notes (and not in the podcast episode 67 itself) because the reference is a little too far outside the scope of the play, but both Hecuba and Fortuna appear in the Carmina Burana. Although most famous in the 1930s setting by Carl Orff that has become so famous in horror films, the original text is a collection of songs and poems called “Songs from Benediktbeuern” or Carmina Burana. The most famous segment of Orff’s music is in fact an invocation to the goddess - ‘O Fortuna’. Treat yourself - play this on LOUD.

Carthage
Carthage was a major city-state in North Africa, an almost-permanent enemy of Rome. Virgil’s depiction of its fiery foundress Dido contains many elements designed to reflect Roman history and politics, as a kind of origin-story for the conflict between the two powers. As Dido dies, she enjoins the spirit of the place to rise up in permanent vengeance and enmity between her city and that of Aeneas - and indeed this certainly came to pass. The most famous episodes in the conflict were the Punic Wars, and perhaps the most famous character of all is Hannibal, the Carthaginian warrior who marched an army - including elephants - through Spain and across the Alps into Italy. He never managed to reach Rome, but is remembered as one of the greatest military strategists in history.

William Cecil, Lord Burghley
William Cecil, 1st Baron Burghley (13 September 1520 – 4 August 1598) was an English statesman, and the chief advisor of Queen Elizabeth I for most of her reign. When she was crowned queen in 1558, he was made her secretary. He stayed in her service until his death, and in that time he served twice as Secretary of State (1550–53 and 1558–72) and thereafter became Lord High Treasurer from 1572 until he died in 1598. His son Robert had an equally impressive political career that spanned the reigns of Elizabeth I and James I.

Certain Precepts for the Well Ordering of a Man's Life
William Cecil, Lord Burghley (see above) wrote these for his son Robert before HE left for Paris in about 1584. You can read the entire set right here, but the ones that are particularly interesting for their parallels to what Polonius says are as follows:

Precept V - Be sure you keep some great man always to your friend, yet trouble him not for trifles; compliment him often, present him with many, yet small gifts, and of little charge, and if you have cause to bestow any great gratuity on him then let it be no chest commodity or obscure thing, but such a one as may be daily in sight, the better to be remembered…

Precept VI - Neither undertake law against any man before you be fully resolved you have the right on your side, which being once so ascertained, then spare neither cost nor pains to accomplish it. 

Precept VII - Beware of suretyship for your best friend

Precept VIII - Towards your superiors be humble yet generous; with your equals familiar yet respective; towards your inferiors show much humility, with some familiarity…

Precept X - be not scurrilous in conversation, nor satirical in your wits… jest when they do savour of too much truth leave a bitterness in the minds of those that are touched.

Chameleon
Shakespeare refers to chameleons in only two other plays - Henry VI.3 and The Two Gentlemen of Verona, as mentioned in the episode. In the latter play both of the references are to how the chameleon was believed to live on air alone - just as Hamlet also suggests. Unfortunately I haven’t managed to find any English images of the marvellous lizard, but this is an illustration from a French book from the 1570s with the marvellous name Des Monstres et Prodiges (Of Monsters and Prodigies) - fascinating to think that the drawing is a quarter of a century older than Hamlet.

Children’s Acting Companies
Companies of boy performers, known as children’s or boys’ companies, enjoyed great popularity in Elizabethan England. The young performers were drawn primarily from choir schools attached to the great chapels and cathedrals, where they received musical training and were taught to perform in religious dramas and classical Latin plays. Famous examples included the Children of the Chapel and the Children of Paul’s. During Elizabeth’s reign these groups were formed into highly professional companies, usually consisting of 8 to 12 boys, who gave public performances outside the court. In the late 16th and early 17th centuries, these companies were so popular that they posed a serious threat to the professional men’s companies - the ‘innovation’ referred to in episode 59.

Christmas
As promised, here is the text of my favourite Christmas poem, written by UA Fanthorpe. Seemingly she writes Christmas poems every year as gifts for her friends - this one is particuarly beautiful. 

BC:AD by UA Fanthorpe

This was the moment when Before
Turned into After, and the future's
Uninvented timekeepers presented arms.

This was the moment when nothing
Happened. Only dull peace
Sprawled boringly over the earth.

This was the moment when even energetic Romans
Could find nothing better to do
Than counting heads in remote provinces.

And this was the moment
When a few farm workers and three
Members of an obscure Persian sect.
Walked haphazard by starlight straight
Into the kingdom of heaven.

Chopine
Unsurprisingly, this is the only instance of this word in all of Shakespeare. A chopine was a rather tall platform shoe, particularly associated with Venice. Perhaps Shakespeare is conflating two ideas - the received wisdom was that actors in ancient Greek tragedy wore tall platforms called kothurnoi, and maybe Shakespeare is being clever and linking theatre and fashion. In both realms, the taller the shoe, the more important the wearer. Of course there’s no guarantee that Shakespeare had any idea of what ancient actors would have worn. Regardless, he’s definitely making a nice flourish for the performer he’s speaking to, commenting that the youngster has grown at least as much taller as one of his fancy (female) costume shoes would make him.

Claudius
Claudius I was emperor of Rome from 41 to 54 AD. His reign occurred between those of Caligula and Nero, two of the more spectacularly crazy Roman Emperors. Due to his marriage to his niece Agrippina the Younger, Claudius was lumped into the same category of Roman depravity. The novelist Robert Graves gave his reputation something of a redemption in his novels I, Claudius and Claudius the God. (These two were the basis of a very memorable BBC adaptation in the late 1970s.)

Cliffs
Cliffs appear often in Shakespeare - often with the epithet 'chalky' attached. In Horatio's worry about Hamlet getting giddy and falling off the edge, Shakespeare gives voice to a peculiar human habit of fantasising about the dangers while standing on a cliff. In King Lear, the startling scene between Gloucester and Edgar likewise plays on the human imagination and the fear of being on the edge. 

Clouds
Aeromancy was the ancient art of reading the future from clouds and other atmospheric conditions. It’s not likely that Hamlet set any store in it, but it is amusing to watch him spotting camels, weasels and even clouds in the “sky” during this scene. Polonius perhaps wisely doesn’t engage too much - he has no desire to get further involved in Hamlet’s madness.

Clowns
There are clown characters throughout Shakespeare’s plays - from as early as Titus Andronicus through Othello and The Winter’s Tale. There is no consensus on where the word’s origin is from (the earliest recorded instance is in the 1560s) but it is perhaps of Scandinavian origin. The great clown of the generation before Shakespeare came to prominence was called Richard Tarleton. His successor has generally been assumed to be Will Kempe.

The Cock Crows
Stage directions are notoriously unreliable in Shakespeare's texts. Very often they are the estimation of editors, trying to remember where things might have happened on the stage in performances they may or may not have even seen! The Folio doesn't have any suggestion at all for where the herald of the morn may sound, but I think it needs to be as late as possible to get as much dramatic tension as possible. We should feel as the audience that the Ghost might indeed be about to speak, only to be thwarted and have to retreat when the bird sings.

Confession
Confession was one of the sacraments that were no longer in use by the emergent Protestant church in England. Hamlet is a play that seems to straddle the divide between England’s Catholic past and Protestant future - here Hamlet is suggesting that Gertrude should repent her sins and maybe take the sacrament of confession, endeavouring to sin no more. Once she is prepared to do so, and thereby be blessed by a priest, he will be prepared to ask for her blessing again. In his soliloquy in Act 3, Claudius seems to feel the loss of access to confession, although his particular state is complicated by his lack of repentance. He is happy with what his crimes gained for him - and how can he repent them and still enjoy their benefits?

Conscience
For Shakespeare, conscience was synonymous with consciousness. It covers a variety of concepts like awareness, morality, even conscientiousness. Hamlet is already planning to “catch the conscience of the king” with the upcoming performance. Here he worries that “conscience does make cowards of us all”.

Crocodiles
Crocodiles show up in three other plays by Shakespeare - Henry VI.ii, Othello and Antony and Cleopatra. No surprise that Shakespeare’s play set on the Nile has two crocodiles, while both others are discussed for their artificial and untrustworthy tears.

The C Word
If Hamlet is being as unpleasant as we think he is, he’s hinting at one of the rudest words in the English language. The word was certainly in existence in Shakespeare’s time (as even the most rudimentary dictionary search will explain) but perhaps wasn’t quite as problematic a word as it (rightly) is today.

Curse of Cain
Cain was the first murderer - he killed his brother Abel. He lied about the murder when God asked about it, and was cursed to a life as a fugitive and a wanderer, since the earth where Abel’s blood spilled would never yield any crops for him. Abel’s murder crops up frequently in the play - Claudius himself makes oblique reference to it very early on, when he mentions' “the first corpse” in his speech about how death is a part of life, and ‘must be so’ as he tries to assuage Hamlet. Abel, the first murder victim, was killed by his brother - it is no accident that Shakespeare plants this little reference in Claudius’ mouth. Cain was notoriously punished - and in some interpretations marked or branded to identify him for his crime - and in this soliloquy Claudius worries that the heinous crime of fratricide will haunt him too.

Cyclops
The Cyclops (whose name means ‘round-eyed’) were a race of giants. They forged Zeus’ thunderbolt, and Poseidon’s trident, among other things. In Homer, one of their number became the most famous Cyclops of all when he was tricked by Odysseus. Although he is now synonymous with the word Cyclops, his name was actually Polyphemus.