Hesperus

Hesperus was the Evening Star in Greek myth, the bright star that appears in the west after sunset. The Greek word hesperos means “of the evening.” Poets praised it as the most beautiful of stars, and later Greek writers identified it with the Morning Star, Eosphorus or Phosphorus, as one and the same star, which they connected with Aphrodite.

The Evening Star in the Poets

Homer compares Achilles, as he races to kill Hector, to Hesperus, the star that goes among the stars in the dark of night and is the fairest star set in the sky (Iliad 22.317–318). The Morning Star, Eosphorus, is the star that goes out bringing light over the earth just before the dawn spreads over the sea (Iliad 23.226–227). Strabo notes that the Locrians in the west of Greece, who were called Hesperian, had the star Hesperus engraved on their public seal (Geography 9.3.1).

Family

Hesiod does not name Hesperus, but he gives the parentage of the Morning Star. Eos, the Dawn, bore to Astraeus the winds Zephyrus, Boreas, and Notus, and after them she bore Eosphorus, the star of the dawn, and the shining stars with which heaven is crowned (Theogony 378–382). The same poet says that Eos bore Memnon and Emathion to Tithonus, and the bold Phaethon to Cephalus (Theogony 984–987).

Later writers treat Hesperus and the Morning Star as a single star with two names. Hyginus says that the star of Venus is called Lucifer, the Latin counterpart of Eosphorus, and that many accounts call it Hesperus as well; it appears to be the largest of the stars. Some, he adds, called it the son of Aurora and Cephalus, outstanding in beauty, and so it is said to have competed with Venus, as Eratosthenes says, and is seen both at sunrise and sunset (Hyginus, Astronomica 2.42). Pliny also reports that when Venus precedes the day and rises in the morning it is called Lucifer, and when it shines in the west it is called Vesper, and that Pythagoras was the first to discover its nature (Natural History, book 2).

Diodorus gives a different Hesperus. In his account, two famous brothers lived in the country called Hesperitis, Hesperus and Atlas, and they owned flocks of sheep of a golden-yellow colour. Hesperus had a daughter Hesperis, whom he gave to Atlas as a wife, and the land was named Hesperitis after her. Atlas and Hesperis had seven daughters, called Atlantides after their father and Hesperides after their mother (Library of History 4.27.1–2).

Hesperus and Aphrodite

The Epinomis, a dialogue attributed to Plato, says that the star called Lucifer or Hesperus (the same star) would reasonably be assigned to Aphrodite (Epinomis 987b). Hyginus likewise calls the star of Venus Lucifer and also Hesperus (Astronomica 2.42). The star was thus counted as Aphrodite’s whether it appeared at evening or at dawn.

Children

Ovid names the Morning Star, Lucifer, as the father of two figures. Ceyx, king of Trachis, was born of Lucifer and carried his father’s brightness in his face (Metamorphoses 11.271–272). Daedalion was the son of the one who calls the dawn and is the last to leave the sky (Metamorphoses 11.295–296). Ovid names the father as the Morning Star, not the Evening Star; Hyginus says the same star is also called Hesperus. The Hesperides are not his daughters in Hesiod, where they are daughters of Night (Theogony 213–216); in Diodorus, Hesperus is their grandfather through Hesperis.

Hesperus Sources

Homer, Iliad 22.317–318 and 23.226–227; Hesiod, Theogony 378–382 and 984–987; Diodorus Siculus, Library of History 4.27; Strabo, Geography 9.3.1; Ovid, Metamorphoses 11.268–300; Hyginus, Astronomica 2.42; Pliny, Natural History, book 2; Epinomis 987b.

See Also: Eos, Cephalus, Astraeus, Phosphorus, Aphrodite, Hesperides, Atlas