BERENICE, the name of several Egyptian and Jewish princesses. The two most generally known are— Berenice, the daughter of Magus, king of Cyrene, and the wife of Ptolemy Euergetes, of Egypt. During her husband’s absence on an expedition to Syria, she dedicated her hair to Venus for his safe return, and placed it in the temple of the goddess at Zephyrium. The hair having by some unknown means disappeared, Conon, the mathematician, explained the phenomenon in courtly phrase, saying that it had been carried to the heavens and placed among the stars. The name Coma Berenices, applied to a constellation, commemorates this incident. Only a few lines remain of the poem in which Callimachus celebrated the transformation, but there is a fine translation of it by Catullus. Berenice, daughter of Agrippa I., king of Judaea, and born probably about 28 a.d. She was first married to her uncle, Herod, after whose death she lived for some years with her brother Agrippa, not without scandal. Her second husband was Polemo, king of Cilicia, but she soon deserted him, and returned again to Agrippa, with whom she was living when Paul appeared before him at Caesarea. During the devastation of Judaea by the Romans, she fascinated Titus, whom she accompanied to Rome, and who would willingly have married her had it not been for the hatred cherished by the people against the Jewish race.