GLAUCUS: According to Ovid in Metamorphoses, Glaucus began his life as a mortal fisherman living in the city of Anthedon. He accidentally discovered a magical herb which could bring the fish he caught back to life and decided to try eating it himself. The herb made him immortal, but it also caused him to grow fins instead of arms and a fish's tail instead of legs (though some versions say he simply became a merman-like being), forcing him to dwell forever in the sea. Glaucus was initially upset by this, but Oceanus and Tethys (Titans and parents to the river-gods) welcomed him into their sea-realm and he was quickly accepted among the deities of the sea.
Glaucus fell in love with the beautiful nymph Scylla and wanted her for his wife, but she was appalled by his fish-like features and fled onto land when he tried to approach her. He asked the witch Circe for a potion to make Scylla fall in love with him, but Circe fell in love with him instead. She tried to win his heart with her most passionate and loving words, telling him to scorn Scylla and stay with her. But he replied that trees would grow on the ocean floor and seaweed would grow on the highest mountain before he would stop loving Scylla. In her anger, Circe poisoned the pool where Scylla bathed, transforming her into a terrible monster with six heads and twelve feet, the monster most famously known from "The Odyssey", where Odysseus encountered the infamous non-choice of Scylla or Charybdis.