It was the Bennu bird's cry at the creation of the world that marked the beginning of time. Standing alone on isolated rocks of islands of high ground during the floods the heron represented the first life to appear on the primeval mound which rose from the watery chaos at the first creation. This Egyptian phoenix was also associated with the inundation of the Nile and of the creation.
As a symbol of the rising and setting sun, the Benu was also the lord of the royal jubilee. In the Late Period, the hieroglyph of the bird was used to represent this deity directly. Bennu probably derives from the word weben, meaning "rise" or "shine." The Bennu was associated with the sun and represented the ba or soul of the sun god, Re. The Bennu was the sacred bird of Heliopolis. It had a two long feathers on the crest of it's head and was often crowned with the Atef crown of Osiris (the White Crown with two ostrich plumes on either side) or with the disk of the sun. The Egyptians may have seen this large bird only as an extremely rare visitor or possibly heard tales of it from travelers who had trading expeditions to the Arabian Seas. Archaeologists have found the remains of a much larger heron that lived in the Persian Gulf area 5,000 years ago. The Bennu bird was usually depicted as a heron.
The ancient Egyptians linked the myth of the phoenix with the longings for immortality that were so strong in their civilization, and from there its symbolism spread around the Mediterranean world of late antiquity.
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