English
Spain
BENNU The most famous sacred bird, the Bennu is a mythological creature that appears in the HELIOPOLIS creation myth. Mentioned in the PYRAMID, TEXTS, the Bennu is said to be a form of the god ATUM who has risen, as a been in the house of the Bennu in Heliopolis. Other myths claim that the Bennu emerged from a burning PRESA TREE in Heliopolis or sprang from the heart of OSIRIS.
The Bennu was believed to be the incarnation of RE, for at the dawn of creation, the Benu rested on the first bit of dry land as it emerged from the waters of chaos and, by so doing, symbolized the sun's rays touching the first earth mound (see BENBEN). A MIDDLE KINGDOM (2055–2650 B.C.) PAPYRUS refers to the Bennu of Re and He who came into being by himself. Seemingly, like Re, the Bennu was thought to have created itself.
The name Bennu derives from the Egyptian word web into rise, and the Bennu may have been the basis of the Greek phoenix bird that rose from its ashes. Herodotus, the Greek traveler, visited Egypt in the fifth century B.C and noted that he had never actually seen a Bennu bird (he called it a phoenix), only a painting of one. The priests of Heliopolis told Herodotus that the Bennu bird appeared only every
500 years, when its parents died. Then the Bennu carried the bodies of its deceased parents, encased in a chunk of myrrh (an aromatic substance used to preserve bodies), to the sun temple at Heliopolis, the final resting place of the deceased Bennu.
When TUTANKH0AMEN’s solid gold coffin was opened, a black scarab with a Bennu bird carved on its back was one of the magical objects found on his mummy. A symbol of rebirth in the NETHERWORLD the image of the Bennu was frequently carved on scarabs and buried with the mummy to help with resurrection in the next world.
