Phoenix

Miniature of the Beast of Aberdeen: ave fénix rebirth from his ashes.

The phoenix that surpasses the Maison de la Louve in Brussels.

In Greek mythology, the phoenix (ancient Greek, φοῖνιξ; romanization, phoînix; pronunciation, pʰó͜ɪ̀nikʰs (classical), pʰˈyːnikʰs (Koine), ɸˈyniks (medieval or Byzantine) is a long-lived bird that regenerates from the ashes of its predecessor.According to some sources, the phoenix dies in a spectacle of flame and combustion, although there are other sources that claim that the legendary bird dies and simply decays before being born again. There are different traditions regarding the lifespan of the phoenix, but in most of these the phoenix lives for about 500 years before its rebirth.. Herodotus, Lucanus, Pliny the Elder, Pope Clement I, Lactantius, Ovid, and Isidore of Seville are among those who have contributed to the retelling and transmission of the theme of the Phoenix Bird. In ancient Greece and Rome, the phoenix was associated with Phoenicia, (modern Lebanon), a civilization famous for its production of purple dye from shells and for its long-distance maritime trade across the Mediterranean.

In the historical record, the phoenix "could symbolize renewal in general, as well as the sun, time, the Empire, metempsychosis, consecration, resurrection, life in Paradise, Christ, Mary, celestial virginity, man exceptional and certain aspects of the Christian life".

Mythology

The theme of the Phoenix bird fed various religious doctrines and conceptions of survival in the Hereafter, as the Phoenix fades to be reborn in all its glory. According to the myth, he possessed several strange gifts, such as the virtue that his tears were healing, supernatural strength, control over fire, and great physical resistance. In Ancient Egypt it was called Bennu and was associated with the flooding of the Nile, the resurrection, and the Sun. The phoenix has been a symbol of the physical and spiritual body, the power of fire, purification, and immortality. For Herodotus, Pliny the Elder and Epiphanius of Salamis, this sacred bird traveled to Egypt every five hundred years, and appeared in the city of Heliopolis, carrying on his shoulders the corpse of his father, where he was going to die, to deposit it in the Gate of the Temple of the Sun.

Probably the legend of the phoenix passed from the Egyptian to the Greco-Roman tradition through the historian Herodotus (484-425 BC), who tells in his stories that he traveled to Egypt and also met to the Egyptian priests of Heliopolis

Another sacred bird is there that I have only seen in painting, whose name is the phoenix. Rare are, in fact, the times that are seen, and so late in the afternoon, that according to the Heliopolis only comes to Egypt every five hundred years to know when his father dies. If in its size and conformation it is as described, its mote and figure are very similar to those of the eagle, and its feathers in golden part, in part of the color of crimson. Such are the wonders that tell us of it, that although for my little worthy of faith, I will not hate to refer them.
To move his father's body from Arabia to the temple of the Sun, he uses the following maneuver: he forms first of all a solid egg of myrrh, so large as his forces reach to carry it, testing his weight after being formed to experience if it is compatible with them; he then empties it until he opens a hole where he can lock his father's body; he adjusts with another portion of myrrh and binds the egg, Here, whatever it is, what that bird refers to.

Herodote.

From now on, the myth appears in works by various classical authors: the naturalist Pliny the Elder (Naturalis Historia, Book X, Ch. II), the writer Luciano, the rhetorician Seneca, the historian Tacitus and the poets Ovid and Claudio Claudiano, or Christians like Pope Clement of Rome, Epifanio de Salamis or Saint Ambrose.

Miniature of the phoenix bird, in the Beast of Aberdeen

According to Christianized legend ^{[citation needed]}, the phoenix lived in the Garden of Paradise, and nested in a rose bush. When Adam and Eve were expelled, from the sword of the angel that banished them a spark arose that lit the phoenix's nest, causing it and its occupant to burn. As the only beast that had refused to taste the paradise fruit, he was granted several gifts, such as the power of fire and light, the most prominent being immortality through the ability to be reborn from his ashes.

When it was time to die, it would make a nest of spices and aromatic herbs, it would lay a single egg, which it hatched for three days, and on the third day it would burn. The phoenix burned completely and, when it was reduced to ashes, the same phoenix bird, always unique and eternal, would rise from the egg. This happened every five hundred years.

The phoenix bird, in The Nuremberg Chronicles.

Estatua de la Unión y el Fénix, en Santa Cruz de Tenerife (Spain).

There's a bird, called a phoenix. This is the only one of its kind, lives five hundred years; and when it has reached the time of its dissolution and is to die, it becomes a coffin of incense and myrrh and other spices, in which it enters into the fullness of its time, and dies. But when the flesh breaks down, it is engendered a certain larva, which nourishes itself from the moisture of the dead creature and leaves its wings. Then, when he has grown quite large, this larva takes with him the coffin in which his father's bones are found, and takes them from the country of Arabia to Egypt, to a place called the City of the Sun; and in the day, and in the sight of all, flying to the altar of the Sun, deposits them there; and once this is done, he undertakes the return. Then the priests examine the records of the times, and find that it has come when the five hundred years have been fulfilled.

Clement of Rome. Epistle to the Corinthians (XXV).

For Saint Ambrose, the phoenix dies consumed by the Sun, turned into ashes from which it is reborn, after burning its body, as a small animal without limbs, a very white worm that grows and lodges inside an egg round, as if it were a caterpillar that becomes a butterfly, until ceasing to be featherless it becomes a celestial eagle that flies through the starry firmament.

During the reign of Emperor Claudius, a supposed phoenix was captured in Egypt and taken to Rome, where he had it exposed. Nobody took it seriously.

Claudio Claudiano (IV century), considered the last of the great Roman poets, commented:

The phoenix is a bird equal to the heavenly gods, which competes with the stars in their way of life and in the duration of their existence, and overcomes the course of time with the rebirth of their members. Do not calm your hunger by eating or turning off your thirst with any source.

Claudio Claudiano

In Chinese mythology, the Fenghuang, while bearing no similarities to the phoenix, has been dubbed the "Chinese Phoenix" by some Westerners, being a creature with a snake's neck, a fish's body, and the back of a turtle. It symbolizes the union of yin and yang.

Bestiaries

Bestiaries are collections of fables about animals, especially from medieval literature. There are various bestiaries that include the Phoenix between its pages.

• In the Etymologies de San Isidoro de Sevilla (José Oroz Reta, Manuel-A. Marcos Casquero, Manuel C. Days and Díaz, 2004, 953-955) describes the phoenix as a bird from Arabia that every five hundred years forms a pine (understood as a coffin and nest at once) with various aromatic branches and provokes a fire with the smoothing of their wings to finally reborn from their ashes. In addition, characteristic of this book, the author establishes the origin of this word in the Latin root of the word Phoeniceus, which in turn we know that it derives from the Greek ≈ονιε, which means the same. However, in Greek this word also designates the name of a very special purple colour, one that was exclusive of Phoenicia. Thus, we see how the word phoenix really links in all this, as it was said that this mythological bird had that characteristic color in its feathers.
• In the Beast of Aberdeensimilar to Etymologies from San Isidoro, it is declared that the phoenix is a bird from Arabia that every five hundred years forms a pine with various aromatic branches and causes a fire with the smoothing of its wings, so it is consumed in its own fire and a worm arises among its ashes that will grow in size until it recovers the form it had before.
• In the beast De Propietatibus rerum We are told of the phoenix something similar to the previous beasts: it comes from Arabia, it is unique, there are no more copies, and it adds that everyone was marveled when they saw him step into the funeral pyre. The latter describes it with great detail, counting as the bird decides by its own will to enter the fiery nest and as the worm coming out of the ashes acquires again the vigor it had. In addition, he states that Uzziah, king-sacrifice of Judah, built in Heliopolis (which in Greek means city of the sun) a temple similar to the phoenix. In it he lit a fire with aromatic branches and before all a Phoenix bird descended and burned in the fire of the priest. He collected the ashes and on the third day the bird was born of them.