--- In
cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Glen Gordon" <glengordon01@...>
wrote:
>
> >What is the origin of Chinese Phenix?
>...The concept seems to relate to "dragons" imo and was originally
>a water symbolism. I feel that Chinese mythology was greatly
>affected by the mythologies further west.
I would argue that the symbolism is primarily solar. The Egyptian
bennu bird(I understand coming from a word webenu meaning "rise" or
shine") is said to rise from the eastern ocean every morning. There
is also similarity Persian simurgh was said to live 1700 years. When
a new simurgh hatched, the opposite-sex parent of the bird burnt
itself to death.
In China, the phoenix is often equated with the empress, while the
dragon is connected with the emperor. In Slavic tradition, the
firebird is female and connected with the sun/hearth goddess. There
are some similarities with the firebird story and the Japanese sun
goddess Amaterasu (And Amaterasu is said to be the ancestor of the
peacock emperor-Shades of Hera?) All this makes me wonder if the
phoenix, the identification with sun, and probably with the sun
goddess is part of a widespread mythological tradition that is hard
to pin down. It does seem to be strongly represented in central asia
via Slavic myth and the prominence of solar bird characters in
Iranian mythos as well.
Cort Williams