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A new book, by Joseph Nigg, about the mythical “bird” – the Phoenix – encouraged me to look at the mythical story, to see if it offered a UFO idea, and it does….

I have a number of books about mythology, but only a few had material on The Phoenix:

These two books provide ample “information” on the myth, as does Wikipedia:

 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoenix_(mythology)

The classic Bullfinch’s Ages of Fable or Beauties of Mythology by Thomas Bullfinch [Revised by Reverend J. Loughran Scott, David McKay, Publisher, Philadelphia, 1898] provides this from Tacitus:

“ … the miraculous bird known by the name of the Phoenix, after disappearing for a series of ages, revisited Egypt. It was attended in its flight by a group of various birds, all attracted by its novelty, and gazing with wonder at so beautiful an appearance …

“He [the baby phoenix] collects a quantity of myrrh, and makes frequent excursions with a load on his back … he takes up the body of his father [the Phoenix] and flies with it to the altar of the Sun. where he leaves it to be consumed in flames …the myrrh is compacted in he form of an egg, in which the dead Phoenix is enclosed. From the mouldering flesh a worm springs, and when grown large, is transformed into a bird … Herodotus describes the bird …Part of his plumage is gold-colored and part crimson …” [Page 387]

The “New Larousse Encyclopedia of Mythology [Hamlyn, London, 1959/1983]  has this:

“The Bird Bennu … [which] the ancients did not doubt his reality … was … connected with the cult of Ra and was perhaps even a secondary form of Ra. He is identified … with the Phoenix … The Phoenix, it as said, appeared in Egypt once every five hundred years.” [Page 45]

Myths and Legends of All Nations by Herbert Spencer Robinson and Knox Wilson [Bantam, NY, 1950] tells [on Page 259] that the Phoenix, which lived for 500 to 1000 years, would build a nest, endowed with spices, and unguents, “sing a melodious dirge, flap its wings to set fire to the pile, burn itself ton ashes, and come forth with new life to repeat the cycle once again.”

Now what does this have to do with UFOs?

The Phoenix was a meme for the ancients, mostly the Egyptians, then, sort of, for the Greeks.

It was a “reality” – from which developed the mythos, not unlike the UFO mythos.

And, as we all know (or should), at the core of a myth is a truth from which the myth sprouts and evolves.

So, was a UFO (or many) seen by ancient humans landing and taking off in a cloud of explosive fire, something like Lonnie Zamora’s egg-shaped Socorro craft?

Yes, this speculation, has the taint of Ancient Astronaut theory, except for the idea that such observed phenomena was extraterrestrial alien beings.

The phenomenon could have been anything, even an actual bird, which is more probable than the vanguard of an alien species obsessed with this forlorn, backwater we call Earth.

No matter what evoked the Phoenix myth, it is a palpable example of how a myth survives, even if we have no idea what caused the myth to sprout in the first place.

[The Phoenix image, at page top, comes from http://aminoapps.com/page/anime/6653307/the-legend-of-the-phoenix]

RR