There are two different traditions about the giant Cyclopes of ancient Greece. Polyphemus, the Cyclope blinded by Odysseus in the Odyssey , is depicted as a malevolent monster, but curiously, nowhere does Homer specifically state that Polyphemus had only one eye in the middle of his forehead.

The other tradition was described by the Greek poet Hesiod in his poem the Theogeny (origin of the gods). There the Cyclopes were sons of Uranus (the sky) and Gaia (the earth) and did have only a single eye in the center of the forehead. They were often depicted as blacksmiths at the forge, providing thunderbolts to Zeus and the trident to Poseidon, which were then used to overcome the Titans. Having only one eye seems a hazardous situation for a blacksmith. Probably during the Bronze Age and early Iron Age it was so common for metal workers to have lost an eye from a spark or foreign body that myth incorporated this element in it.

Submitted by Ronald S. Fishman of the Cogan Ophthalmic History Society