iii. 14), where he compares the victorious return of the Roman
from Iberia to that of Hercules--“Herculis ritu.” The first authenticated occupation of the country was by the Phœnicians, who colonized it extensively, but according to their usual practice endeavoured long to keep their discovery secret. The name of the country “_Span_” in the Phœnician signifies “a mystery.” The rivalry between Rome and Carthage brought the Romans subsequently to the Peninsula, and Spain since that period has played a great part in the history of the world.
The warlike character of the ancient Spaniards is attested by a variety of circumstances; by the terrific struggle which they maintained against the overwhelming power of Rome, by their determined and unflinching resistance to Hannibal as well as Scipio, by such desperately sustained sieges as those of Saguntum and Numantia, by the complimentary allusions to their valour with which the Latin poets abound, and not least by the reputation of their ancient armour, which was in the highest esteem at Rome in the days of Julius and Augustus Cæsar. Thus, when Horace addresses Iccius on his change of the study of Philosophy for a military life, he twits him with having promised better things than to exchange his splendid library for Iberian cuirasses:
Cùm tu coëmptos undique nobiles Libros Panæti, Socraticam et domum Mutare loricis Iberis, Pollicitus meliora, tendis? _Carm._ i. 29.
The metallurgic fame of Spain covers a period of nearly two score centuries. It is attested by Hudibras and Horace, by Le Sage and Pliny:--“Iron ores are almost everywhere found ... there is a variety of different species ... and great difference in the forges. But the greatest difference of all is the water, into which it is plunged when red-hot. This glory of her iron has ennobled certain places, as Bilbilis in Spain,” _lib._ xxxiv. _cap._ 14. Pliny here alludes to the town now known as Bilbao, which retained its reputation for sword-blades, like Toledo, down to a recent period. He speaks of it as a city in Tarracon or Cantabria, corresponding with the Basque Provinces of which Bilbao is one of the chief towns. How strange that, after the lapse of seventeen centuries, representatives from this very Bilbao should have accompanied the Asturian Deputies to England to solicit a subsidy of arms from the descendants of those who were such utter barbarians, when the cuirasses of Cantabria were eagerly sought after by the nobles of Imperial Rome!
The Greeks called Italy “Hesperia,” because it was situated to the west of them, and the Romans called Spain “Hesperia” equally, because it was to the west of Italy. But the Latin poets, imitating the Greeks, very frequently call Italy “Hesperia” also. Thus Virgil:
Est locus, Hesperiam Graii cognomine dicunt. _Æn._ i. 534.
Macrobius prefers deriving the origin of the name, as applied to Italy, from its western situation, to the fact of its being chosen by Hesperus for his residence, when he was expelled by his brother Atlas: “Italy is called Hesperia, because it lies to the west.” (Macrob. _Saturn._ lib. i. cap. 3.)
Horace, when he applies the name to Spain, distinguishes the latter country by the addition of the word “ultima,” thus:
Qui nunc Hesperiâ sospes ab ultimâ Caris multa sodalibus, &c. _Carm._ i. 36.
Strabo, lib. i. seems to derive the name from situation, where he describes the Spaniards as the most western nation, “μάλιστα ἑσπέριοι.” And both he and Pliny state that Hispania was likewise called Iberia, either from a king of that name or from the river Iberus (Ebro).
Iberia, though the name by which, after Hispania, Spain was most commonly known to the Latins was, by a confusion not very complimentary to their geographical accuracy, likewise the name of a region in Asia Minor. It was a tract in Pontus separated from Colchis by the Moschic mountains, and corresponds with the modern Georgia:
Herbasque, quas Iolcos atque Iberia Mittit venenorum ferax. Horat. _Epod._ 5.
The names “Hesperia” and “Iberia” are found together in the same stanza of Camóens as applied to the Peninsula, yet with some vague attempt to confine the latter name to the Spanish portion exclusively:
“Nome em armas ditoso, em noss’ Hesperia, * * * * * Se não quizera ir ver a terra Iberia.” _Lus._ iv. 54.
Both names are properly applicable to the entire Peninsula, including Spain and Portugal, the second epithet, modified by the prefix _Celto_ into “Celtiberia,” being the ancient name of Aragon and Catalonia, and Iliberia that of Granada. The name Iberia as applied to Spain is found in Virgil, _Æn._ ix. 582:
Pictus acu chlamydem, et ferrugine clarus Iberâ,
and under this name the country is described elaborately by Avienus (P. C. 380).
Quamque suis opibus cumulavit Iberia dives, &c.
Ausonius (also P. C. 380) makes use of both the names “Hispania” and “Iberia:”
His Hispanus ager tellus ubi dives Iberum.
Juvenal (P. C. 120) uses the name “Hispania” as the distinctive appellation of the country, which became better and more perilously known in his time than in the days of Horace and Virgil:
Horrida vitanda est Hispania. _Sat._ viii. 116.
There is classical authority for a happy variety of names in describing Spain--“Hesperia,” “Iberia,” “Hispania:”
Tum sibi Callaïco Brutus cognomen in hoste Fecit, et Hispanam sanguine tinxit humum. Ov. _Fast._ vi. 461.
Herculis ritu, modò dictus, ô plebs, Morte venalem petiisse laurum Cæsar, Hispanâ repetit Penates Victor ab orâ 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! Ov. _Met._ xi. 769.
A very amusing and somewhat malicious mistake was recently witnessed at one of our English Universities. A prize was offered for a composition on “_Hesperiæ mala luctuosæ_.” Spain was manifestly intended. But the wags spreading all manner of doubts and difficulties, the “Dons” were obliged to come out with a public notice, intimating that “the gentlemen had better confine themselves to the Spanish Peninsula!”
Cantabria, which is the scene of this poem, was likewise the scene of some of Augustus’s victories. His policy seems to have been here as successful as his generalship. “Domuit autem, partim ductu, partim auspiciis suis Cantabriam.” (Sueton. _cap._ 20.) But the Cantabrians, then as now unformed for subjugation, rebelled again the moment Augustus returned to Rome. Augustus, however, paid them a second visit, and appears to have quieted them in Roman fashion, this being the last of his warlike exploits: “Hic finis Augusto bellicorum certaminum fuit: idem rebellandi finis Hispaniæ.” (Luc. Flor. _lib._ iv. c. 12.)
It was the proud distinction of the Cantabrian in the ancient world to be indomitable, a character very significantly assigned to him in Horace’s well known line:
Cantabrum indoctum juga ferre nostra. _Carm._ ii. 6.
In a later ode Horace commemorates the subjugation of the Cantabrians, but it was only momentary, and the difficulty with which it was effected is acknowledged by the poet himself:--
Servit Hispanæ vetus hostis oræ Cantaber, serâ domitus catenâ.
These are splendid tributes to the valour which resisted the then irresistible Roman power. The Cantabrian strength was broken, and they were temporarily subjected by Agrippa (Sueton. _Octav._ c. 20), but it was only to rise again the moment they had recovered their shattered forces.
Cantabria corresponded (as already observed) with the modern Basque Provinces, and gave with the neighbouring Asturia more trouble to the Romans than all the rest of Spain, the mountainous character of the country aiding them in that resistance to which they were prompted by the hardy mountaineer’s character, and by his inherent love of
The mountain-nymph, sweet Liberty!
“Two most powerful nations (says Florus, lib. iv. cap. 12), the Cantabri and the Astures, were still free from the Imperial sway. The determination of the Cantabrians was _pejor_ (so the proud Roman calls it) and loftier, and more pertinacious in rebellion, for not content with defending their own liberty, they sought even to control their neighbours.... Beaten at last, they retired to the lofty mountain Vinnius, to which they deemed that the Ocean would ascend before the Roman arms.... But he in person drew them from these mountains, and reduced them beneath the crown by right of war.” Florus is here describing the last expedition against the Cantabrians in the reign of Augustus, of which Agrippa was commander. Suetonius gives the same narrative in substance in _Octav. cap._ xx., and Strabo, _lib._ iii. Silius Italicus pays even a still greater tribute to the indomitable spirit of the Cantabrians:
Cantaber ante omnes hyemisque, æstusque, famisque Invictus.
Horace in that variety of refined flattery, with whose incense he knew how to intoxicate Augustus, returns frequently to his Cantabrian wars, and while his object is to praise the Roman pays unceasing tributes to Spanish valour. Thus:
Te Cantaber non antè domabilis Miratur, ô tutela præsens Italiæ dominæque Romæ! _Carm._ iv. 14.
Again, commemorating the triumph of Agrippa under Augustus, in the year U. C. 733:
Cantaber Agrippæ, Claudî virtute Neronis Armenius cecidit. _Epist._ i. 12.
Agrippa was not the only one of Augustus’s generals, who was despatched to the conquest of Cantabria, and with dubious success. Lucius Æmilius had before failed in the attempt.
It is curious enough that the Britons, the Gauls, and the Spaniards are alluded to by name, and in the exact order of their greatness, in three successive lines of an ode of Horace:
Te belluosus qui remotis Obstrepit Oceanus Britannis, Te non paventis funera Galliæ, Duræque tellus audit Iberiæ. _Carm._ iv. 14.
Singular approximation of nations whose struggles in the Peninsular War were to make so famous near twenty centuries later!
In the Peninsula I do not expect much appreciation, where even amongst those who palaver English, English poetry is not at all understood, and where once a littérateur, expressing his sham admiration of Shakspeare, spoke to me of “_Macabets_ as one progidy of a tradegy!” I am not prepared to sacrifice to an ambition which nothing but undue praise could conciliate, and I shall be satisfied with the approval of my own countrymen, if I can only have the good fortune to secure it.
_Corunna, September, 1846._
IBERIA WON.
A Poem.
IN TWELVE CANTOS.
IBERIA WON.