Sunday 1 November 2020

Firebird

Ancient Greek: Ἰατραγόρας (Iatragóras, “a Scythian given name”, literally “fire-searcher?”) 


Legend about the time before people learned how to make fire...In Slavic folklore, the Firebird (Russian: жар-пти́ца, Serbian Žar Ptica...) is a magical glowing bird from a faraway land, which is both a blessing and a bringer of doom to its captor...

The Firebird is described as a large bird with majestic plumage that glows brightly emitting red, orange, and yellow light, like a bonfire that is just past the turbulent flame...

The feathers do not cease glowing if removed, and one feather can light a large room if not concealed. In later iconography, the form of the Firebird is usually that of a smallish fire-colored peacock, complete with a crest on its head and tail feathers with glowing "eyes"...

Firebird is found in fairy tales as an object of a difficult quest. The quest is usually initiated by finding a lost tail feather, at which point the hero sets out to find and capture the live bird, sometimes of his own accord, but usually on the bidding of a father or king...

I believe that the fire bird story is an amazing description of the man's quest for fire before people invented the way to produce it themselves...

Fire bird represents the fire in the sky, the fire in the clouds, the electricity, the lighting that flickers and flashes in the clouds during storms...

Sometimes the fire bird flies down from the clouds to nest. This is a lightning striking the ground. The nesting fire bird is a burning bush of a tree struck by a lightning...

What is left after the fire bird ascends back to heaven are a few or just one of her feathers, magic feathers which can light up the whole room. These are smouldering branches left after the tree or bush has burnt down...

Our hero would then go in search for the fire bird, the next place where lightning would strike the ground and set a tree or a bush on fire. You can imagine how difficult that quest was...

This story is present in every Slavic nation, but similar stories, with almost identical plot, managed to crop up in Germany, Sweden, Belgium and Ireland...

How old are these stories? Well depends when you think fire making was invented...

By the way, the sacred bird of Perun, the Slavic thunder god, was a "fire cockerel" 

3 comments:

  1. "Sulica - a variety of a light spear of Baltic origin with a short shaft and a long and narrow spear mounted on it [1]. Used from the 12th to the 16th century [2]. Also referred to in the sources as szulycza, lancea alias sulica, cuspidea alias sulica, spiculis alias" sulica. [3] " ZAR PTYCIA
    the point is that no one knows where such a weapon comes from And in mythology it has been preserved as a flying bird reborn, that is, pulled out again

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  2. Maybe that is why kur = cock (bird) amd kur = fire?

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  3. Ha, and kur = cock (not bird) ��

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