[Milton-L] angelica's question

[John T. Shawcross]

Adding just a bit to Erick Ramalho's important email about "Iberia":
The Greek form was aspirated as "Hiberes," meaning the Spaniards  
(often used without the h), and relating to the river Hiberus (early  
on in Spain, Iberus), and now called the Ebro; but also meaning (to  
the Greeks) the people of that Caucasian area, now Georgia. (There's  
probably some reason for the duplication, but I don't know what it  
is.) Milton regularly deleted such aspirations from nouns in English:  
thus "Iberian" in PR (twice: 2.200—but Spanish reference—and 3.318— 
Caucasian) and "A Mask" (60—again Spanish). In all cases it is  
spelled without the h; in "A Mask" that's the spelling in the TM, BM  
(capital J), 1637, 1645,1673. You might compare "Ebrew" that comes  
through in "Tetrachordon" (25, 64, 93), "Colasterion" (2, 17), and  
"Samson Agonistes" (The Argument and 1540).

John