Blair Collection > Celtic researches, on the origin, traditions & language, of the ancient Britons

194
The hero receives directions from Prometheus, how to ob-
tain the fruit, namely, that he should attend his brother
Atlas, the Hyperborean, and get him to fetch it, out of
the neighbouring garden of the Hesperides. Apoilodor.
L. ii. C. 4. *
It will be recollected, that Prometheus was one of the
lapetidce, and son, or native inhabitant, of Asia Propria,
who had been expelled from thence to the neighbourhood
of Mount Caucasus, in Asiatic Scythia, as Atlas himself
had been driven from the same native spot, into the Kest of
Europe. It appears from hence^ to what family these
apples belonged.
We are informed, by our British triads, that the first
iX9,me given to this island, before it was inhabited, was Clâs
Merdin, the garden of Merddin. TV. Arch. V. 2. P. 1.
The name of Merddin has been conferred upon old bards,
but is originally, a mythological term. His tzcin sister h
Gzvenddydd, or the morning star: He must have been
himself some luminary, in a similar character.
Merddin, if Mer-Din, be its root, is dueller of the sea;
if Mer-dain gives it birth, it is, the comely one of the sea.
It implies, in cither sense, the eveiiing star, or HesperuSy
the western luminary.
* Several of the ancients, wlio wrote after the Carihageniavs had extended
their voyages, describe the seat of Atlas and tlie Htsptridas, as attached to
Africa. It is very usual to distinguish newly discovered places, by familiar
names. Thus we have Keic England, in America; New Holland, and Acw SotttU
Wales, amongst the Antipodes.
Apollodorus, the accurate recorder of tradition, corrects the error.
Atlas, and the gardens of tlte Hesperides, were not, as some represent them to
have been, in Lybia ; but amongst the Hyperboreans.