phoenix

pronunciation

How to pronounce phoenix in British English: UK [ˈfiːnɪks] word uk audio image

How to pronounce phoenix in American English: US [ˈfiːnɪks] word us audio image

Noun:

the state capital and largest city of Arizona; situated in a former desert that has become a prosperous agricultural center thanks to irrigation
a large monocotyledonous genus of pinnate-leaved palms found in Asia and Africa
a legendary Arabian bird said to periodically burn itself to death and emerge from the ashes as a new phoenix; according to most versions only one phoenix lived at a time and it renewed itself every 500 years
a constellation in the southern hemisphere near Tucana and Sculptor

Word Origin

phoenix: phoenix: [OE] The phoenix, a fabulous bird which every 500 years consumed itself by fire and then rose again from its own ashes, may get its name from the red flames in which it perished. The word comes via Latin phoenix from Greek phoinix, which as well as ‘phoenix’ denoted ‘Phoenician’ and ‘purple’, and it has been speculated that it may be related to phoinós ‘blood-red’.

phoenix (n.): Old English and Old French fenix, from Medieval Latin phenix, from Latin phoenix, from Greek phoinix, mythical bird of Arabia which flew to Egypt every 500 years to be reborn, also "the date" (fruit and tree), also "Phoenician," literally "purple-red," perhaps a foreign word (Egyptian has been suggested), or from phoinos "blood-red." Exact relation and order of the senses in Greek is unclear.Ðone wudu weardaþ wundrum fægerfugel feþrum se is fenix hatan["Phoenix," c.900]Spelling assimilated to Greek 16c. (see ph). Figurative sense of "that which rises from the ashes of what was destroyed" is attested from 1590s. The city in Arizona, U.S., so called because it was founded in 1867 on the site of an ancient Native American settlement.