| "Most beings spring .from other individuals: butthere is a certain kind which reproduces itself. TheAssyrians call it the Phoenix. It does not live on fruitor flowers, but on frankincense and odoriferous gums.When it has lived five hundred years, it builds itself anest in the branches of an oak, or on the top of a palmtree. In this it collects cinnamon, and spikenard, andmyrrh, and of these materials builds a pue on which itdeposits itself, and dying, breathes out its last breathamidst odours. From the body of the parent bird, ayoung Phoenix issues forth, destined to live as longa life as its predecessor. When this has grown up andgained sufficient strength, it lifts its nest from the tree(its own cradle and its parent s sepulcher), and carries.it to the city of Heliopolis in Egypt, and deposits it inthe temple of the Sun." Ovid s Metamorphoses, Book XV, beginning line 579 |
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