Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography Volume I Part 2.djvu/334

 HISPAKIA. Iberia, in its narrower acnse, that is, the maritime district from the Straits to the Pyrenees. (Polyb. loc. sup. eit) : but this h a sabject which needs a se- parate discussion under its proper.head. [Tautessus.] 6. Ethnic and Adjective Formt. — (1.) From Ibrria : jE^(A/l^i}p, gen/Iffi|pos, pL ol "l^npcf, fem. SO. 20, pi. Iberea, CatuU. ix. 6, also Hiber, Hiberes ; and Iberi or Hiberi, Virg. Georg, iii. 406, fern. Iberina, Juv, vi. 53 : A^. ^l6ripiKos, whence ^ *l8ii- piK^ for the country itself; fern, ri leyjplaSy 'idSos; Lat Iberus, Ibericus, and rarely Iberiacus (Sil. Ital. xiii. 510). (2.) Connected with Hispania : £th. and Adj. 'Iviravot, Const Porph. de Admin. Imp, ii. 23 ; Zonar. iii. p. 406 ; HispSuus, Hispani, Adv. Hispane ; also Spanus, Schul. Juv. xiv. 279 ; Am- pelius 6 ; and Spanicus, Geogr. Bav. iv. sub fin. ; Ac^. Hispaniensis (the distinction between this and the ethnic being nicely drawn in the following ex- amples: Veil. ii. 51, Baibus Cornelius non His- panimtis iMittw, sed Hispcams, that b, not merely belonging to Spam^ like, for example, a Eoman bom in Spain, but a true Spaniard^ and Mart. xii. Praef. : Ne liomamj si ita decreveriSf non Hispanimsem liJbrum miUamuSy sed Hispanum)f and rarely Uis- panicus. (Suet Aug. 89, Vitruv. vii. 3.) IL Spain as known to the Greeks. The west of Europe was to the early Greeks a land of fancy as wdl as myatery. Vagne reports liad reached Uiem, probably through the Plioenicians, from which they at first learnt little more than the bare eiustence of lands, so far distant from their own country as to reach the region of the settlttK aun and the banks of the all-encompaeeing river Ocean. According to the very natural tendency which led them to place the happiest regions and the choicest productions of the earth at its extreme parts, confirmed perhaps by exaggerated accounts of the fertility and beauty whidi some of these regions (Andalncia, for instance) actually enjoy, they fiincied them as happy plains or as enchanted islands, and peopled them with the divine nymphs, Circe and Calypso, who there detained in sweet bondage the hero whom fate had cast upon their shores, with the happy spirits of departed heroes, with the primitive and pastoral Cyclopes, and the wealthy maritime Phoenicians, or with the exiled dynasty of gods, " Who with Saturn old, Fled over Adria to the Hesperian fields^ Or o'er the CeUUs roamed the utmost isles.* These poetic fancies were 8ucceGSa1)y1ust(>ncaI inquiries, and then came all the difficulties of recon- ciling meagre and conflicting testimonies with the poets and with each other; mistakes arising £rom first assigning positions vaguely and variously, and then, instead of the discovery of such errors, the attempt to reconcile them by supposed migrations and other arbitrary devices ] so that such names as Bb- BKYCES, Chalybes, CiMMERii,and lBERE8,scarce]y seem associated with any exact locality, and are freely transferred backwards and forwards between the shores of the Atlantic and those of the Euxine. To this was added the polemical spirit, which we find so rampant among the old geographers (as among the African and Arctic critics now), which " by decision more embroiled the fray;** wliile all the time tiie later poets were adding to the confusion by imitating the legends of the ancients, and inventing others of their own. Amidst all these elements of uncertainty HISPAKIA. 1075 it is no wonder thai we generally find no sttie basis of information concerning the more distant countries of the world until the arms of Borne had cleared the way for the inquiries of the learned Greek. But yet the neglect of tliis period would deprive the science of ancient geography of a great portion of its iuteret>t, and of its use, too, in throwing light on the progress of our race. And in no case is this period more attractive than in that of the remotest countiy towards the West, one which is invested with the double interest of having been familiar to the Phoenicians, as a principal scene of their commerce and colonisatbn, while the Greeks were still making it a favourite theatre for the creations of their fancy. 1. Of the purely Mythical Period little b to be said, and that little more proprly belongs to other articles. [Cinmkrii, Ocean us; Fobtunatae In- sular; Uksperides, Aeaka; Hercuus Colum- nar, &c ; and the articles Gekyon, Hebculks, &c in the Dictionary of Greek and Roman My- thohgy and Biography.'] 2. Advancing to the Semi- Mythical Period of Hesiod and the Lyric PoetSy we begin to meet with names which have at least the appearance of a spe- cific geographical significance, though still mOst im- certain as to their portion ; such as Tabtessub. In connection with the legends of the Hyperboi-eans, the Rbipaean mountains appear as a great range in- tersecting Europe from W. to E. The Istkr and Ekidanus were known by name to Hesiod {Theog. 338, 339) as rivers of W. Europe; and his island Erytheia. the abode of Geryon, is so described as to prepare the way for its subsequent identification with Gades. 3. The transition to the period of more real, though still most imperfect knowledge, marked by the age of the Logographers and Tragic Poets, is extremely gradual, for while the avowed writers of fiction are seen to invest their acenes with only an appearance of fact, the investigators of facts are found recording under that guise the strangest fic- tions. But yet there is no doubt that both give us what is meant to be objective knowledge; and no reader of the ProtnetheuSf for example, can doubt that Aeschylus expends all the resources of his geo- graphical knowledge, be they less or more, on his description of the wanderings of lo. Indeed, with reference to our present subject, we Iiave now reached a period when the maritime enterprise of the Phoe- caeans had placed the Greeks in direct c(»mectioa with the shores of the W. part of the Mediterranean ; and had made them acquainted with Tyrrhenia, Ibe- ria, and Tartessns. (Herod, i. 163.) Acoordmgly we find the l<^gograi^er Pherecydes and the poet Stesi- chorus not only acquainted with the name Tab- TEsaus ; but the latter making it a river, in such a manner as to suggest its klentification with the Guadalquivir [Baktis], while the former accurately represents it as a city on the straits which divide l«ibya from Europe [Tartessus]. Stesidiorus mentions also the island of Erytheia, and an island Sarpedonia in the Atlantic. (Strab. iii. p. 148; Schol. Apoll. Rhod. i. 211.) Pindar seems well acquainted with the Pillars of Hercules, as the limit of the known world [HsRCuus Coluhnae] ; and Aes- chylus, besides some other interesting allusions, too doubtful, however, to be discussed here, seeks for the sources of the Ister in the Bliipaean mountains, a fact of which the importance will be more clearly seen when the views of Herodotus have been discussed. (Schol. Apoll.Bhod.iv.28; Ukert, vQl.ii.pt l.pp236— 243.) 3z 2
 * l^pi5 ; Lat. Iber, Lucan. vi. 255, Hor. Carm, ii.