Bennu

The Bennu is a heron-like bird and the soul of Ra, an Egyptian forerunner of the phoenix. By one account it created itself, alighting on the first mound of earth to rise from the waters of chaos, and its cry broke the original silence to set creation in motion. Sacred to the sun, it perched in the holy willow at Heliopolis and was linked to the Benben, the primeval stone. The Bennu heralds renewal: the daily rebirth of the sun, the annual flooding of the Nile, and the rising of new life from death. Through it the Egyptians saw existence forever regenerating itself from the edge of nothing.