Bennu (Egyptian Phoenix)
The Bennu is the sacred heron-like bird of Egyptian mythology, the original Egyptian phoenix. It was the ba (soul) of Ra and the soul of Osiris. The Bennu is associated with creation; snip it alighted on the primordial mound (Benben) at the first sunrise, breaking the silence of the primeval waters with its cry. The Benben stone, the pyramidal capstone of obelisks, represents the mound upon which the Bennu perched. It also represents the annual flooding of the Nile and the cycle of death and rebirth. The Greeks later identified the Bennu with their own phoenix, but the Egyptian version predate