⁂ Tieck has reproduced the history of Magalona in German (1773-1853).
Mage Negro King, Gaspar, king of Tarshish, a black Ethiop, and tallest of the three Magi. His offering was myrrh, indicative of death.
As the Mage negro king to Christ the babe.
Robert Browning, Luria, i.
Maggy, the half-witted granddaughter of little Dorrit’s nurse. She had had a fever at the age of ten, from ill-treatment, and her mind and intellect never went beyond that period. Thus, if asked her age, she always replied, “Ten;” and she always repeated the last two or three words of what was said to her. She called Amy Dorritt “Little Mother.”
She was about eight and twenty, with large bones, large features, large feet and hands, large eyes, and no hair. Her large eyes were limpid and almost colorless; they seemed to be very little affected by light, and to stand unnaturally still. There was also that attentive listening expression in her face, which is seen in the faces of the blind; but she was not blind, having one tolerably serviceable eye. Her face was not exceedingly ugly, being redeemed by a smile.... A great white cap, with a quantity of opaque frilling ... apologized for Maggy’s baldness, and made it so difficult for her old black bonnet to retain its place on her head, that it held on round her neck like a gypsy’s baby.... The rest of her dress resembled sea-weed, with here and there a gigantic tea-leaf. Her shawl looked like a huge tea-leaf after long infusion.—C. Dickens, Little Dorrit, ix. (1857).
Magi, or Three Kings of Cologne, the “wise men from the East,” who followed the guiding-star to the manger in Bethlehem with offerings. Melchior, king of Nubia, the shortest of the three, offered gold, indicative of royalty; Balthazar, king of Chaldea, offered frankincense, indicative of divinity; and Gaspar, king of Tarshish, a black Ethiop, the tallest of the three, offered myrrh, symbolic of death.
Melchior means “king of light”[light”]; Balthazar “lord of treasures;” and Gaspar or Caspar, “the white one.”
⁂ Klopstock, in his Messiah, makes the Magi six in number, and gives the names as Hadad, Selima, Zimri, Mirja, Beled and Sunith—Bk. v. (1771).
Magic Rings, like that which Gyges, minister to King Candaules of Lydia, found in the flanks of a brazen horse. By means of this ring, which made its wearer invisible, Gyges first dishonored the queen, and then with her assistance, assassinated the king and usurped his throne.—Plato’s Republic; Cicero’s Offices.