MIRERPOIX, Diocese of: V. PAMIERS, Diocese of.
MIRIAM, King of GEORGIA. — Born in 265 from the Sassanid family of Persia, died in 342.
A strong and courageous warrior, he married at the age of fifteen a certain Nana.
During his reign, through the apostolate of a holy virgin named Nina, of Armenian origin, who had fled the persecutions in her own country, Georgia embraced the Christian religion. M., moved by the miracles performed by Nina, by the example of his wife, and perhaps also by political reasons, requested priests to instruct his people from Emperor Constantine and St. Gregory the Illuminator. He built several churches and worked greatly to establish the ecclesiastical hierarchy. The Georgian Church venerates him as a saint.
BIBL.: Rufinus, Hist. ecc., I, 10; Socrates, Hist. ecc., I, 20; Sozomen, Hist. ecc., II, 7; A. Palmieri, La Chiesa georgiana e le sue origini, in Bessarione, I (1901), pp. 397-403; 2 (1902), pp. 188-204, 333-43; 4 (1904), pp. 17-25, 117-24.