Ill 
90 THEBES. 
CHAP, to the story of the removal of Hectors ashes, 
in obedience to the Oracle, from his Trojan grave, 
to become an object of reverence in the city of 
Cadmus'. The superstition respecting this biid 
is older than Herodotus'; and in after ages the 
(1) Ori^aTot KaifiSio vrofiv xaravanrxovrsi, 
A'/k' ihktin vrar^a,* eixiTii ffuv afi.uf^,ovi nXovrm, 
*E| 'Affi}];, Aih hnKritis ^^coa tnfisirh. 
Fausan. Bccot. c. '25. p. 758. ed. Kahnii. 
(2) "'Effrt Se a.X'k'ii opvi; ipi(, tu tutc(/.a fl>o7vi^. (Herodoli Euterpe, lib. ii. 
p. 117. Lond. l6'9.) The superstition concerning this bird existed 
in Eg]/pt long before the time oi Herodotus y who saw there a reprcseida- 
tion of the Phoenix, and says it Iwre a resemblance to the Eagle : {Ibid.) 
The same may be said of the figure on the TheOan bas-relief, which might 
be taken for an Eagle, but for the circumstance of the Heliopolitan 
Obelisk, ov Pillar of the Sun, which refers it at once to the Phoenix, 
The earliest /"AeJaws could not have been unacquainted with the notions 
entertained of the Phccnix ; because its very name, and perhaps the 
origin of its fabulous history, were y^ssyrian. Ovid tells us from whom 
it received its appellation : 
" Solis avi specimen — — ^— 
Una est quae reparet, seque ipsa reseminet, ales ; 
Assi/rii Phoenica 'vocant." Metamorph. lib. xv. 
And Claudian, by whom it is repeatedly mentioned, having dignified 
the history of the Phosnix with all the majesty of his Muse, expresses 
himself in language thatwould not have been inapplicable as an epitaph 
upon the Soros here mentioned ; admitting that it really enshrined the 
deified relics of the son of Priam. 
" O senium positura rogo, falsisque sepulchris 
Natales habitare vices, qui sEepe renasci 
Exitio, proprioqiie soles pubescere letho. 
O felix, hasresque tui ! quo solvimur omnes, 
Hoc tibi suppeditat vires, prabetur origo 
Per cinerem, moritur te non pereunte senectus." 
Claud, de Phcenice. 
