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The Gift Of The Magi
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15480 |
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Section : |
NATURAL SCIENCE
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12 / 1989 |
1,352 Words |
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Nigel Groom
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In the life of Jesus, myrrh is present both at his birth in Bethlehem and his death in Jerusalem. Saint Matthew's narrative ensured that the visit of the Magi--the wise men, with gold, frankincense, and myrrh, for "he that is called King of the Jews"--is well remembered. But myrrh also appears in the last offering made to Jesus at the crucifixion--"and they gave him to drink wine mingled with myrrh, but he received it not." And later Nicodemus brought "a mixture of myrrh and aloes," with which the body was wound in a cloth.
The appearance of myrrh at the birth and death of Jesus underlines the symbolism attached by tradition to the gifts of the Magi: Gold is the emblem of royalty; frankincense betokens divinity; and myrrh, derived from a Semitic word meaning "bitter" (after myrrh's bitter taste), signifies the bitterness of Christ's persecution and death.
Myrrh had no such morbid connotation in the ancient world. It was a rare, expensive, and highly desirable luxury, often used in medicine and, above all, in making perfume.
"Arabia is the only place that produces frankincense, myrrh, cassia, cinnamon and the gum called labdanum," wrote Herodotus in about 450 B.C. These were the principal ingredients of the perfumes of his time. Herodotus added: "All these, except myrrh, cause the Arabians a lot of trouble to collect."
Botanically, Herodotus was not strictly accurate. Frankincense and myrrh grow not only in south Arabia but also in the Horn of Africa and in Ethiopia; labdanum is found widely in the Middle East; and cassia and cinnamon did not originate in Arabia. But for centuries commerce in these valuable products was in the hands of Arabian merchants.
Herodotus provides the earliest literary reference to the myrrh trade, but Egyptian inscriptions--dated more than a thousand years earlier than Herodotus--tell of expeditions to collect aromatics from the land of Punt. One of these inscriptions was portrayed in colorful frescoes painted in about 1500 B.C. on the walls of Queen Hatshepsut's temple at Dayr al-Bahri, near Thebes. Five ships are depicted journeying to Punt (possibly the coastal area of Eritrea) to seek an aromatic called intyw. Intyw was almost certainly a form of myrrh. Sackloads of it are shown being carried on board, together with whole trees, and the gum is described as able to provide "an unguent for the divine limbs" of the God-queen. Unguents, or ointments, were in those days the principal means of applying perfume to the body.
Myrrh is a gum resin and comes in different varieties from various species of a small tree called Commiphora. The ancient Egyptians seem to have sought "scented myrrh," also called perfumed bdellium, from the tree Commiphora erythraea. The species that produced the myrrh most sought after by the Greeks and Romans was Commiphora myrrha, found growing fairly widely both in South Arabia and in neighboring parts of Africa.
The Commiphora myrrha tree grows to nearly fifteen feet and is known for its extraordinarily gnarled and straggly appearance. Its branches project at all angles, bear small leaves, and are covered with needle-sharp thorns. The gum exudes from the stem and branches in small drops that harden and are then scraped off. The gum is very oily, in contrast to the dry,
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