Sorrento, Italy — Homer could hardly have chosen a better setting for what is arguably the defining moment in The Odyssey: the temptation of Odysseus by the intoxicating yet deadly Sirens.
The encounter is set in the waters near Sorrento — a name likely derived from the Latin Sirentum, or “Land of the Sirens” — situated on an idyllic stretch of Mediterranean coastline. In Christopher Nolan’s film adaptation, the scene was shot in the Aeolian Islands, off the coast of Lipari. Although Homer doesn’t make the point, the beguiling beauty of this setting would have added to the lure of the Sirens.
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