Bird Gods in Ancient Europe 



The phoenix was a symbol of the sun and 

 there needs no guess to identify the phoenix 

 with the eagle, especially since the eagle burns 



§ itself into youth again 

 by contact with the sun. 

 Herodotus tells how its 

 picture, which he saw in 

 Egypt, had feathers of 

 outline and size was as 

 hundred years, when its 

 '"'"^ son brings its body from 



Arabia to the temple of Helios in Sun-city on 

 the Nile. 



Phoenix the fiery red was, as we have seen 

 when considering the peacock, a form of Pan, 

 but we find him fully humanized as Phoenix 

 the blind king whom the Argonauts found a 

 prey to the Harpies ; later Cheiron restored 

 his sight ; it was he according to Homer who 



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