But that question must not here be passed over: whether in the ark of Noah there was the bird named Phoenix, celebrated by the proclamation of many writers even to a miracle and beyond belief. For if anyone considers with himself the things reported about the Phoenix, he will find them to be such that they seem able to generate contrary opinions on that question.¹

For the Phoenix is said to be the only one in all the world, nor were there more than one at any time on earth. It is therefore a singular and solitary bird, without a mate, either male or female: but whatever animals entered the ark had the distinction of sex into male and female. For from every species of animals God commanded two to be taken, that is, the male and the female. The Phoenix, therefore, in which there is no distinction of sex, was not in the ark. But, on the contrary, we are compelled to confess that it was in the ark, by this reasoning: that they relate the Phoenix to be generated no otherwise than from the embers or ashes of a dead Phoenix. Therefore the Phoenix can be generated only from a Phoenix — though not immediately, yet mediately: wherefore, if it had not been in the ark, its species would have perished in the flood.²

My opinion (to indicate it to the reader in a few words) is this: that all the things narrated about the Phoenix seem to me of very doubtful truth. I would say something more, did not the authority of St. Ambrose compel me to speak sparingly and modestly on the matter — Ambrose, who, in the Oration which he wrote on the Faith of the resurrection, says that the history of the Phoenix is known and approved by frequent report and by the authority of the scriptures. There holds me, besides, the reverence of the ancient Fathers, who proved the future resurrection of the dead by the example and argument of the Phoenix at once: although they, using the things reported about the Phoenix and granted by the wise men of the pagans, wisely used them against those very [pagans] to confirm the faith of the resurrection. But let others think as they please; I confess frankly that I can scarcely, scarcely even, be brought to accommodate assent and belief to the history of the Phoenix.³

I have hitherto heard no one, read no one (who is to be believed) who says that he has seen a Phoenix — unless perhaps in a picture, in which we also behold Hippocentaurs, Chimaeras, and things that can in no way exist, depicted. Indeed, both Greeks and Latins received the history of the Phoenix from the Egyptians: and who does not know that Egypt was once most fertile of ever-new fictions and lies, as Africa [is] of new animals and monsters? Pliny certainly does not conceal that the things handed down about the Phoenix do not seem to him likely. “Before all birds,” he says, “Arabia produces the noble Phoenix (I do not know whether fabulously) — one in the whole world, and not much seen: of the size of an eagle, with the gleam of gold about the neck, the rest purple, with blue feathers distinguishing the tail, with crests honoring the face and head with a feathery tuft.”⁴

Tacitus likewise testifies that the things published about the Phoenix are uncertain and augmented by fabulous marvels: at which place he affirms that, with Tiberius as princeps and in the consulship of Paulus Fabius and Lucius Vitellius (in the year 787 from the founding of the city), it became widely reported that a Phoenix had been seen in Egypt after a long circuit of ages, and that it furnished material to the most learned of the natives and of the Greeks for discoursing much about that marvel. But because in it neither the age, nor the native soil, nor many other things agreed with those that ancient memory had established about the Phoenix, therefore many thought it had been a false Phoenix. Cornelius too…⁵

…Cornelius Valerianus relates that a Phoenix flew down into Egypt in the consulship of Q. Plautius and Sex. Papinius; and it was brought even into the city [Rome], during the censorship of the emperor Claudius, in the 800th year of the city, and displayed in the Comitium — which is attested by the [public] records — but which no one would doubt to have been a false Phoenix.⁶

But what of more recent [writers], whose concern it was to investigate these things curiously and diligently? They thought these things no less fabulous. “Many have proclaimed the Phoenix a bird,” says Cardano, “nearer to fable than to truth. Some, however, report that in the interior of India there is a bird by the name of Semenda, which has a beak with a triple row, and (as in lamp-wicks) perforated on every side, with which, about to die, it sings sweetly after the manner of Swans; then, sticks being collected, it kindles them by the motion of its wings, and is burned: from whose ash a worm, and then from the worm a bird, is born again.” But Scaliger [says]: “That the Phoenix is not entirely fabulous, we read in the Commentaries of voyages, that it is found in the interior parts of India (it is called Semenda by the inhabitants). But an added lie diminishes the credit of this history: for they say it has a three-piped beak, from which it emits a musical sound, in imitation of which shepherds have composed an instrument not unpleasant.”⁷

Nor do we lack a philosophical reason, by no means weak, for overturning the credit of that history. For there is no species of corruptible things which does not at all times have many individuals at once. Let the reader survey and run over in thought the species of animals, plants, metals, stones — of all things, in short, upon which generation and decay fall — and he will plainly recognize that what I have said is true. And indeed this was most rightly provided and arranged by nature — or (what is truer to say) by God himself, the maker and ruler of all nature: namely, lest, if any species were contained in only one corruptible individual, when that was destroyed before the generation of another (and it could be destroyed for many causes), the species itself should at the same time perish. Wherefore the species of incorruptible things have only one individual: there is one Sun, one Moon likewise, and the other Planets, each one in its own species. For the whole nature of the species is expressly represented in one incorruptible individual, and its eternity is best preserved.⁸

But if the stars of the eighth heaven which are called fixed are either all of the same species, or certainly many [of the same], this was done on account of the very great distance of that sphere from the earth. For since that sphere is the most noble, and has the chief efficiency — or (as it is the custom to speak in the schools) causality — upon sublunary things, in order that its force and efficacy might be ampler and more copious and more powerful, it was furnished and crowded with many stars of the same species. If these things are true, as they seem most true, who would believe that the species of the Phoenix (noble before all the species of birds) is contained in only one individual, and that one, before the generation of another, liable to various chances of death? For since the Phoenix is mortal, and during the five hundred years which it is said to live manifold destruction from various things could befall it, it would be necessary for that species of bird to be perpetually engaged in the utmost peril of its own extinction. That there is therefore only one Phoenix on earth seems like a fiction, and plainly incredible.⁹

…seems plainly incredible.¹⁰

But if perchance the old and widely spread history of the Phoenix should please the reader, and he does not utterly reject its credit, it will be easy for us to reply: that, granted the truth of its history, it must necessarily be confessed that the Phoenix (no otherwise than the other animals about which it was explained above) was in the Ark. This I will make plain from the singular and admirable manner of generation of that bird, which we have received described by authors. “Of the Birds,” says Pomponius Mela, “the Phoenix is chiefly to be reported, ever unique: for it is not conceived by coition, nor generated by birth, but when it has lasted, perpetual, for a span of five hundred years, it broods upon a pile heaped up for itself with various spices, and is dissolved; then, growing together from the decay of its putrefying members, it conceives itself, and from itself is born again. When it has grown up, it carries off to Egypt the bones of its former body enclosed in myrrh, and, bearing them into the city which they call [the city] of the Sun, on a pyre fragrant with nard, consecrates them with a memorable funeral.”¹¹

Pliny says that, now growing old, after the years of its life — six hundred and sixty — are completed, it builds a nest of twigs of cassia and frankincense, fills it with spices, and dies upon it; then from its bones and marrow there is born first, as it were, a little worm, and thence becomes a chick; and first it renders the due rites to the former funeral, and carries the whole nest near Panchaia into the city of the Sun, and there deposits it on an altar. Most aptly, therefore, did St. Ambrose say that the Phoenix is ignorant of bodily coition, knows not the allurements of lust, but rises from its own pyre — a bird surviving itself, both its own heir and the offspring of its own body and ash. Elsewhere he says that the Phoenix is restored by the revived moisture of its own flesh, and, when it has died, lives again: for [he says] that it enters and dies in a casket adorned for itself by itself with frankincense, myrrh, and other spices, the span of five hundred years prefixed for its living being completed; and that from its moisture there soon arises a worm, and that it gradually grows together into the shape of that bird and is formed into sight.¹²

And these things, indeed, we have received committed to writing by ancient authors concerning the generation of the Phoenix. If, therefore, the Phoenix can be generated in no other way than from the decay, or the embers or ashes, or other remains of a former dead Phoenix, it is certainly established that the Phoenix can be generated only from a Phoenix (if not immediately, certainly mediately). Wherefore, if there were no Phoenix, no Phoenix could be generated either, since the one being born necessarily succeeds the one dying. Hence one may conclude: if there was no Phoenix in the ark of Noah, its species was utterly and forever extinguished by the flood — unless one wishes to imagine that, as at the beginning of the world, so after the flood, the species of the Phoenix was again created, beyond the order and course of nature, by the omnipotence of God alone. But someone will say: that all the animals that were in the ark had the distinction of sex into male and female; and since this distinction is not in the Phoenix, it follows from this that it was not in the ark. But this is easily solved. For because in all the other species of animals (the one Phoenix excepted) two of each species were taken, that is, a male and a female, therefore Moses said simply, absolutely, and generally [that] two of each species…¹³

…that is, a male and a female, entered the ark. Therefore that statement of Moses, like several others in the sacred writings, although generally stated, is nevertheless to be interpreted not of all simply and entirely, but ‘nearly [all]’ (that is, the Phoenix excepted). But the distinction of male and female was required there and commanded by God for this reason: that by the mingling of both sexes the species of animals were to be perpetuated and multiplied after the flood. But the Phoenix is generated and propagated not by the mingling of sex, but by a certain peculiar and singular manner: wherefore the distinction of sex ought not to have a place in it. But enough about this question.¹⁴