Myrrha

Myrrha, also called Smyrna, was a mortal woman in Greek mythology who conceived a forbidden passion for her father, slept with him in disguise, and was turned into the myrrh tree. From the tree was born Adonis. Ancient writers disagree about her father: Apollodorus, following Panyasis, names Theias, king of Assyria, while Ovid names Cinyras, king of Cyprus.

Family

In the version of Panyasis, which Apollodorus reports, Adonis was the son of Theias, king of Assyria, who had a daughter Smyrna (Apollodorus, Library 3.14.4). In Ovid, her father is Cinyras of Cyprus and her mother is Cenchreis, the king’s wife (Metamorphoses 10.298–299 and 10.435). Apollodorus also reports other parentages for Adonis: Cinyras and his wife Metharme, the daughter of Pygmalion, and, in Hesiod, Phoenix and Alphesiboea (Library 3.14.3–4). The Greek word smyrna means myrrh, the resin of the tree into which she was changed.

Her Passion

Apollodorus gives Aphrodite’s anger as the cause. Smyrna did not honour the goddess, and in consequence of the goddess’s wrath she conceived a passion for her father (Library 3.14.4). Ovid tells it differently. Cupid himself denies that his arrows did this to Myrrha, and the poet blames one of the three Furies, who touched her with a Stygian brand and swollen vipers (Metamorphoses 10.311–314). Myrrha struggled against her feelings, and when she was about to hang herself, her old nurse found her and pledged to help her (Metamorphoses 10.378–430).

The Deception

In Apollodorus, with the complicity of her nurse, Smyrna shared her father’s bed without his knowledge for twelve nights (Library 3.14.4). In Ovid, the nurse chose the time of the yearly festival of Ceres, when the married women kept away from their husbands for nine nights and Queen Cenchreis was among them. The nurse found Cinyras heavy with wine and told him of a young girl who loved him, giving a false name and naming the girl’s age as equal to Myrrha’s. She brought Myrrha to the king in the dark and said, “She is yours, Cinyras.” Myrrha left with her father’s child in her womb. The same happened on the next night and on others, until Cinyras, eager to know his lover, brought in a light and saw both his crime and his daughter (Metamorphoses 10.431–473).

Flight and Transformation

In both versions the father seized his sword when he discovered who she was. In Apollodorus she was overtaken and prayed to the gods to be invisible, and the gods in pity turned her into the tree called smyrna, myrrh (Library 3.14.4). In Ovid, she escaped in the dark, wandered through the palm-bearing fields of the Arabians and the Panchaean lands, and after nine months of the moon, tired, came to rest in the Sabaean country. Heavy with her burden, she prayed the gods to take both life and death from her. The earth rose over her legs, roots pushed through her nails, her bones turned to wood, her blood to sap, her arms to branches, her skin to bark. The tree grew over her womb and her breast, and she bent her face into the bark. She weeps still, and the drops that flow from the tree are honoured: the myrrh keeps her name (Metamorphoses 10.476–502).

The Birth of Adonis

Ten months later, according to Apollodorus, the tree burst and Adonis was born (Library 3.14.4). Ovid describes the birth: the child grew under the bark and sought a way out, the tree groaned and wept, and kindly Lucina laid her hands on the branches and spoke the words of childbirth. The bark split, the tree gave up its living burden, and the Naiads laid the boy on soft grass and anointed him with his mother’s tears (Metamorphoses 10.503–514). Apollodorus says that Aphrodite, for the sake of his beauty, hid him as an infant in a chest unknown to the gods and gave him to Persephone, who would not give him back; Zeus then divided the year into three parts for Adonis to spend with himself, with Persephone, and with Aphrodite. The later story of Adonis, including his death from a boar, is told on his own page (Library 3.14.4).

Myrrha Sources

Apollodorus, Library 3.14.3–4; Ovid, Metamorphoses 10.298–314, 10.378–473, and 10.476–514.

See Also: Adonis, Adonis and Aphrodite, Theias, Cinyras, Aphrodite, Persephone