I traced through many cultures. The Aztecs told how during the creation of the present world, the eagle and the jaguar fought over who would have the honor of becoming the sun. The eagle settled the matter by flinging himself into a fire and, thus, becoming the sun. The jaguar, following close behind, settled for becoming the moon, with the spots on his coat showing that he had been only partially burned. In light of this tale, it's easy to see why the Aztec eagle and jaguar warrior societies were considered the most elite of the military orders. The Aztecs also tied the eagle to the sun in another way, comparing the daily journey of the all-important sun to an eagle's flight: rising on the warming air of morning and swooping down out of sight at night in pursuit of prey. The eagle plays a crucial role in the sun dance of the Plains peoples of North America, and symbolizes the sun in the rites of some of the Southwestern tribes. The Iroquois tell of Keneu, the golden eagle, and of Oshadagea, the giant eagle with a lake of dew on his back who lives in the western sky. This Iroquois poem, quoted in The Return of the Sea Eagle by John A. Love (1983) appears to tell of Keneu:I hear the eagle birdWith his great feathers spread,Pulling the blanket back from the east,How swiftly be flies,Bearing the sun to the morning.
On the other side of the Atlantic arose a belief about the eagle and the sun that persisted for many centuries. The eagle was thought to he the only animal capable of looking directly into the sun. Aristotle and Pliny wrote of this and added that the eagle tested its young by facing them to the sun, rejecting any that looked away.The writers of early bestiaries, such as the twelfth-century Book of Beasts, added to the eagle's mystery by giving it the power of eternal youth: When the eagle grows old and his wings become heavy and his eyes become darkened with a mist, then he goes in search of a fountain, and, over against it, he flies up to the height of heaven, even into the circle of the sun, and there he singes his wings and at the same time evaporates the fog of his eyes in ray of the sun. Then at length taking a header down into the fountain, he dips himself three times in it, and instantly he is renewed with a great vigour of plumage and splendor of vision. (myth)--Stephen Friar, A Dictionary of Heraldry, quoting the translation of T. H. WhiteChristians adopted this symbolism, comparing the eagle looking into the sun to Christ looking at His Father, and the renewal of the eagle's youth through its plunge into the fountain to the renewal of the soul through baptism. Even today, an eagle may he spied on the baptismal fonts in some older churches.
