History
Phoenix was the largest of the twelve constellations created by Petrus Plancius from the observations of Pieter Dirkszoon Keyser and Frederick de Houtman and it first appeared on a 35-cm diameter celestial globe published in 1597 (or 1598) in Amsterdam by Plancius with Jodocus Hondius. The first depiction of this constellation in a celestial atlas was in Johann Bayer's Uranometria of 1603.
The same group of stars was imagined by the Arabs as a boat, Al Zaurak, on the nearby river Eridanus. It was also seen to represent Young Ostriches Al Ri'āl, or as a griffin or eagle. Phoenix and the neighbouring constellation of Grus together were seen to portray Aaron the High Priest by Julius Schiller.
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“The history of the world is none other than the progress of the consciousness of freedom.”
—Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770–1831)
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