In Greek mythology, Cinyras (Ancient Greek: Κινύρας) was a famous king of Cyprus, often linked to the cult of Aphrodite at Paphos and, in varying genealogies, to Adonis or Myrrha. Homer knows him as the Cypriot ruler who sent Agamemnon a guest-gift corselet; later sources cast him as a wealthy priest-king, inventor, and tragic father in the Myrrha incest myth. Some scholars connect his name with the Ugaritic lyre-god Kinnaru or Phoenician kinnor.
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I.Family and Cypriot kingship
Genealogies disagree. Apollodorus makes Cinyras son of Sandocus and Pharnace, founder of Paphos, husband of Metharme daughter of Pygmalion, and father of Adonis, Oxyporos, and several daughters. Ovid and others make him father of Myrrha (Smyrna) and, through her, of Adonis; Hyginus calls him son of Paphos; Hesychius, son of Apollo. Strabo says he had previously ruled at Byblos. The city Cinyreia and the priestly Cinyradae of Paphian Aphrodite took their names from him.
II.Trojan War
In the Iliad, Cinyras hears of the Achaean expedition and sends Agamemnon a guest-gift corselet. Later commentary adds that he promised fifty ships but sent only one, the rest being clay models, and was punished by Apollo in a musical contest; his daughters leaped into the sea and became kingfishers.
III.Myrrha
In Ovid's Metamorphoses, Cinyras's daughter Myrrha, driven by unnatural lust (in retribution for her mother Cenchreis's hubris), sleeps with her father, becomes pregnant, and is changed into the myrrh tree; Adonis is born from the wood. Cinyras is said to have killed himself. Other authors equate the pair with Theias of Assyria and Smyrna.
IV.Priesthood of Paphian Aphrodite
Tacitus records that some credited Cinyras with consecrating the temple of Venus at Paphos on the spot where Aphrodite stepped ashore; divination rites were shared with the line of Tamiras until the Cinyradae alone remained. Clement of Alexandria attacks Cinyras for bringing the "lewd orgies" of Aphrodite into the light. Pindar already calls him beloved of Apollo and priest of Aphrodite, and proverbially rich.