Our Italian 1 piece nativity is 11 inches tall and 6 inches wide. The 1 piece nativity portrays Mary kneeling beside baby Jesus and Joseph standing beside her. The baby Jesus is laying in a wooden manger on an ivory blanket, with ivory an ivory swaddling cloth covering him. Mary is wearing a dark crimson gown with a long dark olive cape with white lining. She has a white shawl covering her head. Joseph is wearing a light orchid robe with a dark khaki cape over one shoulder. He is leaning on a long wooden staff. Select this link to view our Christmas nativity scene sets.
Frankincense: The gift of the wise man Gaspar to the baby Jesus, a symbol of Christ’s divinity and worship. Also known as olibanum, it is a fragrant gum resin from African trees of genus boswellia long used as incense in religious services.
There are a number ideas about the symbolism of the gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh. One suggests the gold represented a gift fit for a king. Frankincense was given as a symbol of Jesus becoming the high priest. Myrrh was used in making medicines and would symbolize Jesus becoming a great physician and healer. Another opinion is that these gifts were a kind of symbolic foreshadowing of what the life of this baby would be. Gold, given in recognition of Jesus being a king. Frankincense and myrrh were used to prepare a corpse for burial. Thus these two gifts would foreshadow the dark end Jesus would meet on the cross.
Frankincense is a fragrant gum resin obtained from certain trees that grow in east Africa and southern Arabia. It gives forth a strong, pleasant odor when it is burned. The ancient Hebrews, Greeks and Romans used the gum for religious rites. The name comes from two French words, franc, meaning pure and ences, meaning incense. The scientific name for frankincense is olibanum. It comes to the market in the form of pale colored globules, called tears. Frankincense has been used for embalming, fumigating and as an ingredient of incense. The ancient Egyptians used it in medicines. The fragrant gum resin is used as a raw material for perfumes. Harvesters cut into the bark of the trees and collect the resin in the form of colorless to pale yellow drops called tears. Perfumers extract oil from the tears by dissolving them in alcohol, then passing steam through them. The oil gives perfumes a long-lasting, spicy fragrance. Select this link to view our Christian gift ideas.
Myrrh: The sap of the myrrh tree dries into hard, reddish brown lumps of gum resin known as myrrh. The tree discharges the resin from between the outer layers of the bark, and the resin falls to the ground. The perfume ingredient is an oil obtained by heating the resin to produce a vapor, then cooling the vapor. Although unfamiliar to us today, in ancient times myrrh was a precious and much sought-after substance. The Magi or wise men from the east brought the baby Jesus a gift of myrrh.
There are a number ideas about the symbolism of the gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh. One suggests the gold represented a gift fit for a king. Frankincense was given as a symbol of Jesus becoming the high priest. Myrrh was used in making medicines and would symbolize Jesus becoming a great physician and healer.
Another opinion is that these gifts were a kind of symbolic foreshadowing of what the life of this baby would be. Gold, given in recognition of Jesus being a king. Frankincense and myrrh were used to prepare a corpse for burial. Thus these two gifts would foreshadow the dark end Jesus would meet on the cross.
Ancient records tell us that it was perhaps most commonly employed as a medicine. The Romans Greeks Assyrians and other peoples of the ancient Mediterranean and Near East prescribed myrrh in treatments for a wide variety of afflictions, including sores in the mouth, infections, coughs, and worms. It was also burned to fumigate the rooms of the sick. Myrrh appears at the beginning of Jesus’ life as a gift and at the end of his life as a medicine. The ancient Egyptians used Myrrh in the process of embalming corpses. The ancient Hebrews also treated the dead with myrrh. Myrrh was highly valued as a component of perfume and incense. Myrrh was especially prized as an ingredient in perfumed oils and lotions because of its enduring fragrance and long shelf life. The Hebrews made myrrh one of the primary ingredients of the holy oil with which they anointed their high priests and the sacred objects of their temples. In ancient times, Arabia supplied the Mediterranean and Asia with most of their myrrh and frankincense. These products were so highly valued and so difficult to obtain outside of Arabia they became a luxury affordable only by the rich.