The Hesperides
Nymphs of the West
Garden Hesperides by Edward Burne-Jones
Other names	Atlantides
Abode	Hesperia
Parents	Various

In Greek mythology, the Hesperides (/hɛˈspɛrɪdiːz/; Ancient Greek: Ἑσπερίδες, Greek pronunciation: [hesperídes]) are the nymphs of evening and golden light of sunsets, who were the "Daughters of the Evening" or "Nymphs of the West". They were also called the Atlantides (Ancient Greek: Ἀτλαντίδες, romanized: Atlantídes) from their reputed father, Atlas.^[1]

Etymology

The name means originating from Hesperos (evening). Hesperos, or Vesper in Latin, is the origin of the name Hesperus, the evening star (i.e. the planet Venus) as well as having a shared root with the English word "west".

Mythology

The nymphs of the evening

Ordinarily, the Hesperides number three, like the other Greek triads (the Three Graces and the Three Fates). "Since the Hesperides themselves are mere symbols of the gifts the apples embody, they cannot be actors in a human drama. Their abstract, interchangeable names are a symptom of their impersonality", classicist Evelyn Byrd Harrison has observed.^[2]

They are sometimes portrayed as the evening daughters of Night (Nyx), either alone,^[3] or with Darkness (Erebus),^[4] in accord with the way Eos in the farthermost east, in Colchis, is the daughter of the titan Hyperion. The Hesperides are also listed as the daughters of Atlas^[5] and Hesperis,^[6] or of Phorcys and Ceto,^[7] or of Zeus and Themis.^[8] In a Roman literary source, the nymphs are simply said to be the daughters of Hesperus, embodiment of the "west".^[9]

Nevertheless, among the names given to them, though never all at once, there were either three, four, or seven Hesperides. Apollonius of Rhodes gives the number of three with their names as Aigle, Erytheis, and Hespere (or Hespera).^[10] Hyginus in his preface to the Fabulae names them as Aegle, Hesperie, and Aerica.^{[11][12][13][a]} In another source, they are named Aegle, Arethusa, and Hesperethusa, the three daughters of Hesperus.^[14][15]

Hesiod says that these "clear-voiced Hesperides",^[16] daughters of Nyx (night), guarded the golden apples beyond Ocean in the far west of the world, gives the number of the Hesperides as four, and their names as: Aigle (or Aegle, "dazzling light"), Erytheia (or Erytheis), Hesperia ("sunset glow") whose name refers to the colour of the setting sun, red, yellow, or gold; and lastly Arethusa.^[17] In addition, Hesperia, and Arethusa, the so-called "ox-eyed Hesperethusa".^[18] Apollodorus gives the number of the Hesperides also as four, namely: Aigle, Erytheia, Hesperia (or Hesperie), and Arethusa^[19] while Fulgentius named them as Aegle, Hesperie, Medusa, and Arethusa.^[20][21] However, the historiographer Diodorus in his account stated that they are seven in number with no information of their names.^[6] An ancient vase painting attests the following names as four: Asterope, Chrysothemis, Hygieia, and Lipara; on another seven names as Aiopis, Antheia, Donakis, Calypso, Mermesa, Nelisa, and Tara.^[22] A pyxis has Hippolyte, Mapsaura, and Thetis.^[23] Petrus Apianus attributed to these stars a mythical connection of their own. He believed that they were the seven Hesperides, nymph daughters of Atlas and Hesperis. Their names were: Aegle, Erythea, Arethusa, Hestia, Hespera, Hesperusa, and Hespereia.^[24] A certain Crete, possible eponym of the island of Crete, was also called one of the Hesperides.^[25]

They are sometimes called the "Western Maidens", the "Daughters of Evening", or Erythrai, and the "Sunset Goddesses", designations all apparently tied to their imagined location in the distant west. Hesperis is appropriately the personification of the evening (as Eos is of the dawn) and the Evening Star is Hesperus.

In addition to their tending of the garden, they have taken great pleasure in singing.^[26] Euripides calls them "minstrel maids" as they possess the power of sweet song.^[27] The Hesperides could be hamadryad nymphs or epimeliads as suggested by a passage in which they change into trees: "... Hespere became a poplar and Eretheis an elm, and Aegle a willow's sacred trunk ..." and in the same account, they are described figuratively or literally to have white arms and golden heads.^[28]

Erytheia ("the red one") is one of the Hesperides. The name was applied to an island close to the coast of southern Hispania, which was the site of the original Punic colony of Gades (modern Cadiz). Pliny's Natural History (VI.36) records of the island of Gades:

"On the side which looks towards Spain, at about 100 paces distance, is another long island, three miles wide, on which the original city of Gades stood. By Ephorus and Philistides it is called Erythia, by Timæus and Silenus Aphrodisias, and by the natives the Isle of Juno."

The island was the home of Geryon, who was overcome by Heracles.