Coin of Myndus. Mynecena. See Mvnicess.
MYNICEXS
'782
MYRRH
Mynicens (Lat. mi/necena, fern, of nninnc; allied to 1 moniules) is the name of a class of English monastics ■who flourished in 1009 and 1017, and were probably Benedictines. They differed from nuns in being of younger age, and under a rule more strict. See Wal- cott, Sacred A rchceology, s. v. ; Lea, Sacerdotal Celibacy, p. 179, note.
Mynster, Jacob Peder, a Danish theologian, was bora at Copenhagen Nov. 8, 1775. He was educated at the university of his native city, was employed some time in teaching, and became in 1801 pastor in Seeland. In 1811 he was appointed assistant minister of the prin- cipal church of Copenhagen, in 1828 preacher to the court and the royal family, and in 1834 bishop of See- land. His writings comprise a great number of ser- mons, dissertations introductory to the study of the New Testament, and on other Biblical subjects, and several works on doctrinal theology. His admirable Ordination Sermons and other of his works have been translated into German. An edition of his miscellane- ous ])ublications, lilandede Schriftcr, begun in 18,')'2, was completed in 6 vols, in 185G. He died in Copenhagen Jan. 30, 185-1.
My'ra (jii 'Miipa), one of the chief towns of Lycia, in Asia Minor (Ptol. v, 3, 6). It is " interesting to us as the place where Paul, on his voyage to Kome (Acts xxvii, 5), was removed from the Adramyttian ship which had brought him from Caesarea, and entered the Alex- andrian ship in which he was wrecked on the coast of Malta. See Adramvttium. The travellers had avail- ed themselves of the first of these vessels because their course to Italy necessarily took them past the coasts of the province of Proconsular Asia (ver. 2), expecting in some harbor on these coasts to finil another vessel bound to the westward. This expectation was fulfilled (ver. 6). It might be asked how it happened that an Alex- andrian ship bound for Italy was so far out of her course as to be at Myra. This question is easily answered by those who have some acquaintance with the navigation of the Levant. Myra is nearly due north of Alexandria, tlie harbors in the neighborhood are numerous and good, the mountains high and easily seen, and the current sets along the coast to the westward (Smith's Vvy<i;je and S/iipw7-eck of St. Paid). Moreover, to say nothing of the possibility of landing or taking in passengers or goods, the wind was blowing about this time contin- uously and violently from the N.W., and the same weather which impeded the Adramyttian ship (ver. 4) would be a hinderance to the Alexandrian (see ver. 7 ; Conybeare and Howson, Li/e and I'pistles of St. Paul, ch. xxiii). Some unimportant ]\ISS. having Avarpa in this passage, Grotius conjectured that the true read- ing might be Ai/ivpa (Bentleii Critica Sacra [ed. A. | A. Ellis]). This supposition, though ingenious, is quite unnecessary. Both Limyra and Myra were well known among the maritime cities of Lycia. The harbor of the ' latter was strictly Andriace, distant from it between two and tlirec miles, but the river was navigable to the city (Appian, B. C. iv, 82j" (Smith).
Coin of My
]\Iyra lay about a league from the sea (in X. lat. 3(P 18', E. long. 30^), upon rising ground, at the foot of which flowed a navigable river with an excellent har- bor (Andriace) at its mouth (Strabo, xiv, p. CG5 ; Pliny,
Hist. Nat. xxxii, 8). In later times the emperor Thco- dosius raised it to the rank of the capital of Lycia {Uierocl. p. 084). The town still exists, although in decay, and bears among the Greek inhabitants the an- cient name of Myra ; but the Turks call it iJemhre (see Forbiger, Alte Geogr. ii, 25G). It is remarkable for its fine remains of antiquity (Leake, Asia Minor, p. 183), which have been minutely described by Fellows {Dis- cov. in I.ycia, p. 169 S(j.) and Texier (Desaip. de PAsie Mineure; comp. Spratt and Forbes, 7'rav. in Lycia, i, 131 sq.) (Kitto). "The tombs, enriched with orna- ment, and many of them having inscriptions in the ancient Lycian character, show that it must have been wealthy in early times. Its enormous theatre attests its considerable population in what may be called its Greek age. In the deep gorge which leads into the mountains is a large Byzantine church, a relic of the Christianity which may have begun with Paul's visit. It is reason- able to conjecture that this may have been a metropol- itan church, inasmuch as Myra was the capital of the Roman province. In later times it was curiously called the port of the Adriatic, and visited by Anglo-Saxon travellers (Bohn's Juirly Travels in Palestine, p. 33, 138). Legend says that St. Nicholas, the patron saint of the modern Greek sailors, was born at Patara, and buried at Myra, and his supposed relics were taken to St. Peters- burg by a Russian frigate during the Greek revolu- tion" (Smith). See Asia jMixor.
Myrrh is the rendering in the Auth. Ver. of two Ileb. and one (ir. term. Tlie following account is part- ly from Kitto's Cyclopcedia:
1. "lia or "1112, mor, a/ivpva, doubtless from a She- mitic root (signifying to flow, or else from another ex- pressive of its bitterness), though some of the ancients traced it to the mythological MyiThc, daughter of Ciny- ras, king of Cyprus, who fled to Arabia, and was changed into this tree (Ovid, A rf. A m. i, 288), Myrrh formed an article of the earliest commerce, and was highly esteemed Ly the Egyptians and Jews, as well as by the Greeks and Romans (Plinj-, xiii, 2; Athen. xv, 688; Dioscor, i, 73), as it still is both in the East and in Europe, The earliest notice of it occurs in Exod. xxx, 23, "Take thou also unto thee principal spices, of pure myrrh five hundred shekels," It is afterwards mentioned in Esth. ii, 12, as employed in the purification of women; in Psa. xlv, 8, as a perfume, " All thy garments smell of myrrh and aloes and cassia;" also in several passages of the Song of Solomon, " I will get me to the mountain of myrrh, and to the hill of frankincense" (iv, 6); "My hands drojipod with myrrh, and my fingers with sireet- smtUiny myrrh" (v, 5) ; so in ver. 13, in both which pas- sages, acciiriiing to Rosenmiillcr, it is pi-ofltietit myrrh. We find it mentioned in Matt, ii, 11 among the gifts presented by the wise men of the East to the infant Jesus, "gokl and frankincense and myrrh." It may be remarked as worthy of notice that myrrh anil frankin- cense are fretiucntly mentioned together. In ]Mark xv, 23 we learn tliat the Roman soldiers " gave him (Josus) to drink wine mingled with myrrh, but he received it not" (see Hutten, Dc polu fellco, etc, [fiuben. 1()71] ; Pipping, De polu Christo prodrome [Leips. 1688]). See Gai.i-. The apostle John (xix. 39) says, "Then came also Nicodcmus, and brought a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about a hundred-pound weight." for the pur- ])i)se of embalming the body of our Saviour. Herodotus (iii, 107) mentions Arabia as the last inhabited countrj- towards the south which produced frankincense, myrrh, etc. ; Thcophras- tus (Pliint. ix.4) describes it as being produced in Southern Arabia, about Saba and Adramyt- ta; so Pliny (xii, 33\ Dioscorides (i, 77\ and several other (ireek authors (Strabo, xvi. 769, 782 ; Diod. Sic, V, 41 ; xix, 95), But others have not so limited its production. Celsius {//ieroliot. i, 523) says it was pro- duced in Syria, Gcdrosia (Arnau, L'rped, A I, y'l, -i^l"),