Horat. Carm. iii. 14.
Spain was anciently divided into Hispania Ulterior and Citerior. The former comprehended Bætica, the present Andalucía, and Lusitania nearly corresponding to what is now called Portugal. Hispania Citerior comprised all the rest of the Peninsula. The name “Hesperia” was more commonly applied by the ancient poets to the Italian Peninsula than to the Spanish. Thus Virgil (in addition to the passage above cited):
Et sæpe Hesperiam, sæpe Itala regna vocare. * *
Sed quis ad Hesperiæ venturos littora Teucros
Crederet?
Æn. iii. 185.
The preponderance of authority is clearly in favour of designating Spain as “Iberia” or “Hispania,” and generally confining “Hesperia” to Italy. Ovid has a very charming nymph named Hesperie, no connection, however, of the Hesperides, of whom the most famous was that Arethusa whose fountain-streamlet is so celebrated, and whose enchanting name has been tastefully introduced into the nomenclature of the British Navy. Ovid’s Hesperie, the daughter of Cebrenis, was loved and persecuted by the Trojan hero Æsacos, whose discovery of her is thus exquisitely described:
Aspicit Hesperien patriâ Cebrenida ripâ,
Injectos humeris siccantem sole capillos.
Visa fugit Nymphe!