E. Cobham Brewer 18101897. Dictionary of Phrase and Fable. 1898.
according to one tradition, were Melchior, Gaspar, and Balthazar, three kings of the East. The first offered gold, the emblem of royalty, to the infant Jesus; the second, frankincense, in token of divinity; and the third, myrrh, in prophetic allusion to the persecution unto death which awaited the Man of Sorrows.
MELCHIOR means king of light.
GASPAR, or CASPAR, means the white one.
BALTHAZAR means the lord of treasures.
(Klopstock, in his Messiah, book v., gives these five names: Hadad, Selima, Zimri, Beled, and Sunith.)
Magi, in Camoens Lusiad, means the Indian Brahmins. Ammianus Marcellinus says that the Persian magi derivèd their knowledge from the Brahmins of India (i. 23); and Arianus expressly calls the Brahmins magi (i.7.).