Abigail Spencer

Season: 5, Episodes: 1, Faction: N/A

Overview

Abigail Spencer was a woman living in Oxford, England where she worked at the Quikmart convience store. Living in a row house with her younger sister Theresa, Spencer was forced to tend to her sister following a terrible accident that involved an experiment by Theresa’s boyfriend and college, Daniel Faraday.   

Fertility (Water)

Death

On the mainland (2007)

5×03 – Jughead

   

When Desmond Hume knocked on her door following a lead given to him in the search for Faraday’s mother, Spencer warned Hume not to trust Faraday, claiming him to be a coward after what he did to her sister.

   

While the experiment left Spencer’s sister as an invalid and Faraday disappeared soon after, her financial problems were relieved by the intervention of Charles Widmore. Financing Theresa’s medical bills and affording the family a live-in nurse, Widmore became a symbol of hope and compassion for Spencer. (“Jughead”)

Images Source | Images Source | Source  

Decoded Family Members

Theresa Spencer (Sister)

Decoded Season 2 Characters

Desmond Hume

Charles Widmore

Decoded Season 4 & 5 Characters

Daniel Faraday

Theresa's Nurse

Key Episode(s) to Decoding the Character

5x03 "Jughead"

Wiki Info

Charybdis or Kharybdis was a sea monster, later rationalised as a whirlpool and considered a shipping hazard in the Strait of Messina.

The Mythological Background

In Greek mythology, Charybdis or Kharybdis was once a beautiful naiad and the daughter of Poseidon and Gaia. She takes form as a huge bladder of a creature whose face was all mouth and whose arms and legs were flippers and who swallows huge amounts of water three times a day before she pees it out again, creating whirlpools. In some variations of the tale, Charybdis is just a large whirlpool rather than a sea monster. Charybdis was very loyal to her father in his endless feud with Zeus; it was she who rode the hungry tides after Poseidon had stirred up a storm, and led them onto the beaches, gobbling up whole villages, submerging fields, drowning forests, claiming them for the sea. She won so much land for her father’s kingdom that Zeus became enraged and changed her into a monster.

The myth has Charybdis lying on one side of a narrow channel of water. On the other side of the strait was Scylla, another sea-monster. The two sides of the strait are within an arrow’s range of each other, so close that sailors attempting to avoid Charybdis will pass too close to Scylla and vice versa. The idiom ‘between Scylla and Charybdis’ has therefore come to mean being between two dangers, choosing either of which will bring harm.

Traditionally, the location of Charybdis has been associated with the Strait of Messina off the coast of Sicily and opposite the rock on the Italian mainland identified with Scylla. The vortex there is caused by the meeting of currents but is seldom dangerous.

References in ancient literature

The Odyssey

Throughout the poem, Odysseus is hindered by the efforts of Poseidon and the sea monsters throughout the ocean. Odysseus faced both Charybdis and Scylla in Homer’s Odyssey while rowing through a narrow channel. He ordered his men to avoid Charybdis thus forcing them to pass near Scylla. This resulted in the deaths of six of his men.

Later, stranded on a makeshift raft, Odysseus was swept back through the strait to face Scylla and Charybdis again. This time, Odysseus passed near Charybdis. His raft was sucked into Charybdis’ maw, but Odysseus survived by clinging to a fig tree grown on the rock overhanging her lair. On the next outflow of water, his raft was expelled, and Odysseus was able to recover it and paddle away to safety.

Jason and The Argonauts

The Argonauts were able to avoid both dangers because they were guided by Thetis, one of the Nereids.

Aristotle’s Meteorologica

Aristotle tells a story of Aesop in conflict with a ferryman and relating to him a myth about Charybdis. She took one gulp of the sea and brought the mountains to view; islands appeared after another. The third will dry the sea altogether.

Ovid’s Metamorphoses

In Book VIII of Ovid’s Metamorphoses, Scylla betrays her father and country in order to aid Minos, of whom she is enamoured; however Minos is disgusted by Scylla’s treachery and sails away without her, provoking a damning diatribe insulting his parentage.

hac quoque si prohibes et nos, ingrate, relinquis, non genetrix Europa tibi est, sed inhospita Syrtis, Armeniae tigres austroque agitata Charybdis.

(If you forbid me from here also and abandon me, you ungrateful one Europa is not mother to you, but the inhospitable Syrtis, an Armenian tigress and Charybdis, whipped up by the south wind.)

The Scylla of this story is to be differentiated from Scylla, the counter-part of Charybdis.

Image & Source 

Mythological Family Members & Associated Deities

POSEIDON (Father)	GAIA (Mother)	SCYLLA (Counterpart)	ODYSSEUS	ZEUS	JASON	THETIS
MINOS	EUROPA