The Phoenix from the Past
     The mysterious beginnings of the phoenix (also fenix of phenix) can be seen in its very name, a Greek word that also meansx “purple-red,” “crimson,” “date,” “date palm,” and “Phoenicia.” The date palm continually renews itself, and Phoenicia is “the red land.” Together, the several words suggest that the bird is associated with red and purple and comes from the East, land of the sunrise. Traditionally, the phoenix has been sacred to the sun.

Versions of the Story
     Like the mythical bird itself, the phoenix appears and reappears in books down the centuries. Typical of stories that grow over time, details of the death and rebirth of the phoenix change from one account to another. Herodotus reported only that the reborn phoenix bears the dead parent to the Temple of the Sun in a ball of myrrh. The Roman poet Ovid wrote that the new bird rises from the breast of the old in a nest of spices built in the highest branches of a palm tree, and that the young bird carries nest and all to the Temple of the Sun. As Pliny recorded, a maggot is born from the bones of the older bird and goes into the younger phoenix. The Roman historian Tacitus said that the dying bird builds a nest and “infuses into it a germ of life.”
     As the phoenix fable changes over time, fire eventually becomes a part of the tale. In a fourth-century Latin poem by Lactantius, the older phoenix bursts into flame from the heat of its glowing body and the sun and burns to ashes in its nest of spices. Several centuries later, in the mythical kingdom of Prester John, the phoenix catches fire because it flies too close to the sun. In other versions, the nest of aromatic spices bursts into flame from the sun’s heat and from the fanning of the bird’s wings.
     The life span of the phoenix, too, changes from one version to another, even though the most common number is 500 years. The Greek writer Aelian lightheartedly said the phoenix did not have to count on its fingers to know when it was time to be reborn, because it was so close to nature that it just knew. The 540 years Pliny cites in this period of the Great Year, the time it takes for stars and planets to revolve through an entire cycle. The belief was that because human life was so affected by the position of the planets, history repeats itself through each cycle of the Great Year, just as the phoenix does. The life cycle of the phoenix in other versions of the story varies from 100 years to 12, 954 years.

A Roman Story
     The gluttonous Roman Emperor Heliogabalus, who named himself after a sun god, liked exotic meals. He ordered his cooks to mix gold and gems in his food, and he savored the brains and tongues of birds. Thinking he could become immortal by feasting on the one and only phoenix, Heliogabalus sent his men to the ends of the world to find the rare bird. One envoy returned from the Far East with a brilliant colored creature with long, sweeping tail feathers. Shortly after devouring the delicacy, the Emperor was murdered, leading many to suggest that what he ate was a bird of paradise, but obviously not the immortal phoenix.

The Phoenix of the Middle Ages
     Like many of the other wonder beasts, the phoenix entered a new stage of its history in the Middle Ages. The phoenix is referred to in some translations of the Bible, as when Job says, “In my nest I shall die and like the phoenix extend my days.” Church feathers regarded the death and rebirth of the phoenix as an allegory of Christ’s Resurrection, and the bird is commonly treated in the bestiaries as a symbol of Christ. The Old English poem, “The Phoenix,” based on the Roman poem by Lactantius is a colorful retelling of the story with Christian overtones.

The Phoenix in Heraldy
     The image of the phoenix in heraldy is one of the reasons we think of the bird having outspread wings, seeming to rise from a nest of fire. The heraldic bird that represents the phoenix is the eagle, which reminds us that Herodotus said the phoenix he saw in Egyptian paintings resembled an eagle in shape and size. A phoenix in flames – with the motto, “Her death itself will make her live.” – was used as a symbol for the warrior maiden Joan of Ar, who was burned at the stake for heresy and became a martyr. Also, Queen Elizabeth I of England, who had been imprisoned in the Tower of London before becoming queen, used the phoenix as her heraldic emblem.

Discounted by Scholars
     In his book, Vulgar Errors (1946), Sir Thomas Browne declared there were so many versions of the phoenix story, so many different numbers for its life span, and so many different details of its death and rebirth, that no one could believe any of them. Besides, science had proven that no bird could be immortal. Alexander Ross, called the “Champion of the Ancients,” defended the phoenix against Browne’s attack, but to no avail. A few years later, a German scholar, George Caspard Kirchmayer, wrote:

This creature is quiet a myth and has never been seen except in pictures (I used the words of Herodotus). No man has ever seen it in true reality. Expect a “’til said,” “’tis reported,” “’tis a tale,” or “so they say,” no one can bring forward a clear statement in regard to the matter. I regard as impossible, absurd, and openly ridiculous whatever, except in the way of a fiction, has been told of this creature. Such a belief as that in the phoenix is a slander against Holy Writ, nature, and sound reason.

     Faced with such a hostile world, the Western phoenix withdrew to the land of fable.



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