Birds II
Happy Easter! Just in time, here’s part II of my series of birds in medieval European manuscripts. Today, religious and moral birds.
One of the best places to find birds is the genre known as bestiaries, compilations of animal lore that originated in ancient Greece and were later combined with Christian allegories. The images below are from the Aberdeen Bestiary; sorry about the low quality scans, but I couldn’t find any other complete bestiaries online. The Aberdeen Bestiary is one of the finest of its type, made in England around 1200.
In one of the opening illustrations God creates the fish and birds.
And God said, Let the waters bring forth abundantly the moving creature that hath life, and fowl that may fly above the earth under the firmament of heaven. And God created great whales, and every living creature that moveth, which the waters brought forth abundantly, after their kind, and every winged fowl after his kind: and God saw that it was good. And God blessed them, saying, Be fruitful, and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let fowl multiply in the earth. And the evening and the morning were the fifth day’ (Genesis 1:20-23).
The next image illustrates the chapter on the fox, the false teacher who lures good Christians (the birds) into heresy:
The word vulpis, fox, is, so to say, volupis. For it is fleet-footed and never runs in a straight line but twists and turns. It is a clever, crafty animal. When it is hungry and can find nothing to eat, it rolls itself in red earth so that it seems to be stained with blood, lies on the ground and holds it breath, so that it seems scarcely alive. When birds see that it is not breathing, that it is flecked with blood and that its tongue is sticking out of its mouth, they think that it is dead and descend to perch on it. Thus it seizes them and devours them. The Devil is of a similar nature. For to all who live by the flesh he represents himself as dead until he has them in his gullet and punishes them. But to spiritual men, living in the faith, he is truly dead and reduced to nothing. Those who wish to do the Devil’s work will die, as the apostle says: ‘For if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die; but if ye through the Spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live.’ (Romans, 8:13) And David says: ‘They shall go into the lower parts of the earth: they shall fall by the sword: they shall be a portion for foxes.’ (Psalms, 63:9-10)
The hoopoe represents the ideal parent-child relationship:
When the bird called the hoopoe sees that its parents have grown old and that their eyes are dim, it plucks out their old plumage and licks their eyes and keeps them warm, and its parents’ life is renewed. It as if the hoopoe said to them: ‘Just as you took pains in feeding me, I will do likewise for you.’
If birds, who lack reason, do as much for each other, how much more should men, who have the power of reason, support their parents in return; because the law says: ‘And he that curses his father, or his mother, shall surely be put to death’ (Exodus, 21:17); it is as if he were guilty of parricide or matricide.
The heron:
It is called heron, ardea, as if from ardua, meaning ‘high’, because of its capacity to fly high in the sky; it fears rain and flies above the clouds to avoid experiencing the storms they bring. A heron taking wing shows a storm is coming.
Many people call the heron Tantalus, after the king who betrayed the secrets of the gods. Rabanus says on this subject: ‘This bird can signify the souls of the elect, who fear the disorder of this world, lest they be caught up by chance in the storms of persecution stirred up by the Devil, and raise their minds, reaching above all worldly things to the tranquility of their home in heaven, where the countenance of God is forever to be seen.
Today we associate owls with wisdom, but they had completely different connotations for medieval people:
Isidore says of the owl: ‘The name owl, bubo, is formed from the sound it makes. It is a bird associated with the dead, weighed down, indeed, with its plumage, but forever hindered, too, by the weight of its slothfulness. It lives day and night around burial places and is always found in caves.’
On this subject Rabanus says: ‘The owl signifies those who have given themselves up to the darkness of sin and those who flee from the light of righteousness.’ As a result it is classed among the unclean creatures in Leviticus (see 11:16). Consequently, we can take the owl to mean any kind of sinner.
Many of the bestiary birds were based on real creatures and their actual behaviors, others were purely mythical. Probably the most well-known is the phoenix:
It lives for upwards of five hundred years, and when it observes that it has grown old, it erects a funeral pyre for itself from small branches of aromatic plants, and having turned to face the rays of the sun, beating its wings, it deliberately fans the flames for itself and is consumed in the fire. But on the ninth day after that, the bird rises from its own ashes.
Our Lord Jesus Christ displays the features of this bird, saying: ‘I have the power to lay down my life and to take it again’ (see John, 10:18). If, therefore, the phoenix has the power to destroy and revive itself, why do fools grow angry at the word of God, who is the true son of God, who says: ‘I have the power to lay down my life and to take it again’?
Birds also appear in the Bible itself, such as the raven and dove released by Noah after the flood. Depicted here in Yates Thompson 13, a 14th-century book of hours made in England.
To be honest, I have no idea what is happening in the illumination below, from the Macclesfield Psalter. It looks like a king and his adviser, probably David, who was believed to be the author of the Psalms. But what is the bird doing there? Is it just a bit of marginalia or is it integral to the story of the two figures? You can see the full image here, folio 161 (verso).
One of the most common Christian birds was the eagle that represented the Gospel of John the Evangelist John was thought to have received his inspiration directly from God, much as the eagle flies to the heavens. From the Aberdeen Bestiary’s eagle chapter:
The word ‘eagle’ represents the acute understanding of the saints. The same prophet, Ezekiel, when he described how he had seen the four evangelists in the form of animals, saw the fourth among them, that is, the one signifying John, as an eagle, which left the earth in flight; as John, on earth, penetrated the mysteries with his acute understanding by reflecting on the word. Likewise, those who still leave behind their earthly mind, seek heavenly things, as the eagle with John, through contemplation.
An evangelist symbol appears in each corner of this illumination from Yates Thompson 13: clockwise from top left, Matthew (the man/angel), John (eagle), Matthew (bull), Mark (lion). In the center is the Trinity, God the Father, Christ on the Cross, and between them the dove of the Holy Spirit.
Probably the most well-known of all medieval evangelist leaves, that in the magnificent Book of Kells (Trinity College Dublin, MS 58). John’s eagle is on the lower right, apparently clasping the gospel book in its talons.
The opening page of the Gospel of John from the equally spectacular Lindisfarne Gospels, made by Northumbrian monks during the early 8th century. Interestingly, John sits with a scroll while the eagle carries a codex.
In many cases the eagle is depicted assisting John by holding his pen case and ink bottle, as in the two illuminations below. The first is from a late 15th century French book of hours at the University of Texas at Austin, HRC 006. And don’t forget that the pen itself came from a bird, the pinna, or primary flight feather, was used to make quills.
15-century French book of hours. Columbia University Rare Book Library BP.096.
Doves are one of the oldest Christian symbols, with roots in the imagery of Judaism and other ancient cultures. Representing the Holy Spirit, they appear in many episodes of the life of Christ found in manuscripts. I particularly like the Annunciation, not least because Mary is frequently depicted reading. Below, Mary and the angel in a 15th-century French book of hours, University of Texas at Austin HRC 006. Of all the images in today’s post, this is my favorite.
Below, the Annunciation as depicted in a 13th-century French copy of The Golden Legend, a popular medieval book on the lives of various saints. I love that it looks like the dove is whispering the news in the Virgin’s ear, or maybe it’s just about to crash into her like a plate-glass window. Huntington Library HM 3027.
Three of the Gospel writers describe the Holy Spirit descending from heaven in the form of a dove at the Baptism of Christ.
Then cometh Jesus from Galilee to Jordan unto John, to be baptized of him. But John forbad him, saying, I have need to be baptized of thee, and comest thou to me? And Jesus answering said unto him, suffer it to be so now: for thus it becometh us to fulfill all righteousness. Then he suffered him. And Jesus, when he was baptized, went up straightway out of the water: and, lo, the heavens were opened unto him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove, and lighting upon him: And lo a voice from heaven, saying, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. (Matthew 3:13-17)
German antiphonary dated to 1350, Free Library of Philadelphia Lewis E M 042:11.
Late 13-century French psalter. Free Library of Philadelphia Widener 009.
13th-century Italian antiphonary. Free Library of Philadelphia Lewis E M 026:20-29.
Finally, the dove appears in images of the Pentecost, the descent of the Holy Spirit to the disciples and the Virgin following the Resurrection. I find these images odd, as the Biblical story tells of “tongues of fire” appearing over each person.
And when the day of Pentecost was fully come, they were all with one accord in one place. And suddenly there came a sound from heaven as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting. And there appeared unto them cloven tongues like as of fire, and it sat upon each of them (Acts 2:1-4)
Is there a reason why the dove was substituted for fire so often? Perhaps to maintain symbolic continuity throughout the cycle of illuminations? The image below is from the Free Library of Philadelphia Widener 009.
University of Texas at Austin HRC 006.
Below, the dove appears in an illustration of the Trinity. Late 15th or early 16th-century book of hours made in Flanders for an English patron, now at the Bodleian Library.
Birds part I
If you look carefully you’ll begin to notice birds in all sorts of medieval manuscripts, used as anything from decorative flourishes to representations of the divine. In this series of posts I’ll explore a variety of bird imagery, beginning today with ornamental figures and moving on to birds as symbols of power. In the next post, birds of morality, philosophy, and religion. (As usual, click the images to go directly to the sources.)
Our first examples come from Huntington Library HM 65, a copy of Ptolemy’s Almagest made in southern France in 1279. This is an astronomical text, so the birds and other animals in the margins are purely decorative. Like acanthus leaves and running hares, these birds are a familiar visual trope of the period. Out of all the medieval birds they’re probably my favorites.
Sometimes birds illuminations aren’t just decorative but refer to the text. Harvard University’s Houghton Library MS Typ 0446 is a 13th-century Latin Bible. On one page we see a decorative bird perched on an illuminated initial, but in Exodus a stork appears with a frog in its beak—a reference to the plague of frogs.
Birds also grace the bindings of books. These clasps date from 14th-century Germany. Columbia University X242.1.S.
Bird in a blind stamped binding, bound between 1510 and 1519 by a Dutch binder named John Reynes who was active in London. Huntington Library HM 36336.
The margins of manuscripts were a kind of no-man’s land where artists could explore subversive fears and fantasies. The creepier aspects of birds are apparent in these grotesques from the pages of a 16th-century Dominican gradual. University of Texas at Austin, Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center HRC 013.
But manuscript birds were just as likely to have a humorous character. The Macclesfield Psalter, for instance, depicts a man riding a ‘hobby duck’.
A charming bird sneaks a bite from a penwork initial, from the University of Notre Dame, Hesburgh Library MS 12. You are what you eat, after all.
Birds were also common as heraldic devices and symbols of authority. This lovely 13th-century wax seal featuring a bird on a branch is affixed to a “Quit claim by Gwenllian, widow of Madoc ap Seycil to the monks of Abbey Dore of her widow’s third of the 4 1/2 bovates of land on Grosmont hill which Madoc gave to them for his burial for her soul and the soul of Madoc.” Lawrence, University of Kanses, Kenneth Spencer Research Library MS 191:13.
The Luttrell Psalter is famous for its idealized depiction of English manor life. Here a peasant feed chickens and a man uses a slingshot to drive crows from the newly tilled fields. In this case the birds are a significant part of the manuscript’s meta-narrative: depicting its patron Geoffrey Luttrell as a benevolent and pious lord presiding over a bountiful estate.
Another way that birds embodied power and status was via falconry scenes — depictions of the nobility engaging in one of their favorite pastimes. You could argue that owning a falcon was the medieval equivalent of driving a super car or owning a yacht, and wealthy book patrons would have enjoyed seeing this high status activity reflected in the pages of the luxury texts they commissioned. Below is the illumination for the month of May from the Fecamp Psalter, created in France circa 1180.
Ptolemy with a falcon, from Der Naturen Bloeme, a 14th-century Flemish bestiary, KB KA 16.
Two examples of falconry from British Library Yates Thompson 13, a 14th-century English book of hours: the first is part of a calander page for the month of May.
Ireland Day 2 – Skellig Michael
The Skellig Islands are rocky peaks jutting from the Atlantic about 15km off Ireland’s southwest coast. Little Skellig, home to an important bird colony, is off-limits to visitors, but Greater Skellig was the location of a monastery between 588 and the 12th century and later became a pilgrimage destination.
Tours leave from Port Magee, a short drive down the coast from Cahersiveen. The boat to the islands took about 45 minutes over rough seas, with a brief stop near Little Skellig for a wonderful view of the gannet colony (and there are puffins as well, during other seasons.) My photos of Little Skellig really don’t do it justice—it was mind-blowing.
Next, on to Skellig Michael, where you dock at a primitive landing and climb onto slippery, narrow stone steps, trying to land your feet while the waves bobs violently. (No part of this trip is suitable for the faint-hearted.) The path to the monastery winds up the mountain, offering spectacular views of it’s own sheer sides as well as the ocean and Little Skellig in the distance, looking snow-dusted but actually covered in birds. Soon the path narrows and steepens, then becomes a set of rough slab steps running almost vertically to the summit. The monastery remains well preserved at the top, though visitors only have access to a small section that includes several domed buildings and some graves. When we arrived there was a park ranger giving a really interesting talk on the island’s history and the culture of the monastery. After the climb it’s nice to sit in the sun enjoying the view and thinking about the people who arrived here in wooden boats 1500 years ago.
Leaving the Port Magee harbour.
Gannet colony on Little Skellig – 60,000 breeding pairs!
Great Skellig/Skellig Michael.
View back from about halfway, and Little Skellig in the distance.
Last flight of steps.
Monastery entrance.
History of the Birds of New Zealand Part II
I wrote recently about discovering naturalist Walter Buller and his lovely History of the Birds of New Zealand. To find out more, I made an interlibrary loan request for his biography, Walter Buller, the Reluctant Conservationist by Ross Galbreath, and it finally arrived two weeks ago from the Library of Congress. This was really exciting in and of itself because I’ve never borrowed from the LOC before. The downside is that you have to use their books within the library, so I spent a couple of weeks worth of lunch hours reading it.
It was definitely worth it. Galbreath does a great job telling Buller’s life story and setting it within the social, political and scientific contexts of the time. In fact, I would recommend this book to anyone interested in general New Zealand history. It contains a wealth of information about European colonization, including relationships between settlers and Maori, the shady land deals that occurred on a huge scale, and the settlers’ shifting attitudes toward land, nature and the colonial relationship with Britain. The only thing to be aware of is that the author presupposes a familiarity with New Zealand history, including Maori words and cultural concepts that are not well known outside the country.
Best of all for the book historian, Galbreath includes lots of information on the production and distribution of Buller’s books, including a nice explanation of the differences in lithography (used in the first edition) and chromolithography (used in the second edition,) as well as a series of images showing the working process of the artist J. G. Keulemans.
You can see in the following photo some of the differences between the editions, with the more delicate and vibrant hand-colored lithograph at the top and the olive-toned (because of the type ink used in the process) chromolithograph at the bottom.
As for Buller himself, I was completely unprepared for what I found in the biography. I’d read Audubon’s diaries, so I thought I was inured to mindless slaughter in the name of science, but Buller’s sheer effrontery really blew me away. Part of it was due to the time period. Many Europeans justified the destruction of native species as “survival of the fittest,” the fittest being the introduced species and the Europeans themselves. It is clear that Buller held this view his entire life. He wrote repeatedly that New Zealand birds had no hope of survival, and rather than instituting what he saw as useless protective measures, the only logical step was to take as many specimens as possible before they were all extinct.
At the end of the 19th century, however, sentiments changed. Activists in Britain and the colonies began to see native flora and fauna as deserving of protection. This became a moral issue, with New Zealand one of the first countries to incorporate the word conservation into the vernacular.
Buller, always keen to impress the European elite, publicly paid lip service to this ideal while continuing to take rare specimens for himself and as gifts for prominent British scientists and aristocrats, often sending multiples of the same species to one person. Even after hunting bans were imposed he continued to take specimens. When an island nature preserve was proposed he offered to organize an expedition to capture live Huia on the mainland and transfer them to the island. Instead, he sent the birds to a collector in Britain and told the government that the trip had been fruitless. At this time he wrote publicly of his sadness at the loss of native species, but in private continued to argue that the birds were doomed anyway.
Galbreath argues that, ironically, it was Buller’s own books that helped change the perception of New Zealand wildlife. The beautiful and widely popular illustrations contributed toward the new perception that the country’s flora and fauna were unique and special, and should be considered a source of national pride rather than something to be replaced by European species. New Zealanders whose conservation ideals had been, in part, shaped by Buller’s work now derided his endless quest for specimens and lukewarm support of preservation schemes.
Buller’s legacy is mixed. Luckily, it was his views of conservation that passed into history, while his book A History of the Birds of New Zealand retains its status as a work of natural history and art. Its approachable text and iconic illustrations helped to shape a culture of preservation that is still an important aspect of New Zealand society. I’d definitely recommend both the History of the Birds of New Zealand and Ross Galbreath’s excellent biography to anyone with an interest in natural history and the conservation movement.
Filed under art, biography, biology, birds, colonialism, conservation, ecology, history of the birds of new zealand, illustration, natural history, new zealand, ornithology, science, walter buller | Comment (0)Reading Outside
It’s finally, finally time for outdoor reading. Thus, I spent the morning shopping for the cheapest lawn chair I could find. It’s aluminum and electric blue plastic, but was so cheap I could also afford a set of cushions. (It’s really important to avoid the whole flesh-sticking-to-hot-plastic issue.) Upon arriving home with the loot I proceeded to spend three blissful hours out in the sunshine reading and watching the birds, including a red-tailed hawk that did wild loops over the backyard. I finished A Bend in the River and got halfway through On Chesil Beach before I’d fully restocked my vitamin D stores.
The only downside is that after taking a long shower I still smell like 35+ spf sunscreen.
My trailer-trash lawn chair:
Dies est calidus. Tiny Penguin gets his Latin on:
Tiny Penguin only likes music you’ve never heard of, (which means he’s probably pretty disappointed with the selection on my iPod).
History of the Birds of New Zealand
A few weeks ago I was browsing around the website of the New Zealand Electronic Text Centre when I came across some really interesting bird illustrations. I really like this one titled “The Biter Bit (an incident of bird life in New Zealand).”
The illustrations, by J. G. Keulemans, are from the second edition of A History of the Birds of New Zealand by Walter Buller, 1888. They’re all available at the NZETC along with the full text of the book.
I checked at our local college library and was surprised to find that they had a lovely edition from 1967, edited, annotated and renamed Buller’s Birds of New Zealand, with an introduction by E. G. Turbott that discusses Buller’s life and work. (All quotes in this post are from this copy.)
I was also advised by Alison Stevenson, director of the NZETC, to read Walter Buller: The Reluctant Conservationist, by Ross Galbreath (1989), but have had trouble locating a copy. The cheapest available online would have to be shipped from New Zealand; copies in the US are going for $60 to $200. I made an inter-library loan request, but it might take a while before I have the book in my hands, as the closest copy is in Chicago.
I’m looking forward to it arriving, though, because from what I’ve read Buller sounds like a really interesting character. He was one of the first to compile serious field information on New Zealand bird populations and habitats, and his work was widely praised by the European scientific community. The most important aspect of his research is that it occurred at a time when European colonization was first beginning to impact the avifauna of the islands. Buller carefully documented these ecological changes and related them in prose that was entertaining and equally accessible to amateurs and professionals. A good example is his discussion of the introduction of the rat, from the chapter on the Bellbird:
The cause of the rapid disappearance in New Zealand of some species of birds, and absolute extinction of others, is a very interesting question… As the result of long observation, I have come to the conclusion that, apart from the effects produced by a gradual change in the physical conditions of the country, the chief agent in this rapid destruction of certain species of native birds is the introduced rat. This cosmopolitan pest swarms through every part of the country, and nothing escapes its voracity. It is very abundant in all our woods, and the wonder rather is that any of our insessorial birds are able to rear their broods in safety. Species that nest in hollow trees, or in other situations accessible to the ravages of this little thief, are found to be decreasing, while other species whose nests are, as a rule, more favourably placed, continue to exist in undiminished numbers.
Not all of Buller’s assertions have been borne out by further research, but as of 1967 the work still retained “its place as one of the essential works of reference on the bird fauna of New Zealand.”
Buller, born 1838, became interested in ornithology as a young man living in Wellington, where he met the naturalist William Swainson. By the mid 1860s he was writing well-received essays on ornithology, and the first edition of his History of the Birds of New Zealand was published in installments beginning in 1872, in a total of 500 copies. Each copy contained 35 hand-colored lithographs by J. G. Keulemans. “Reviews commending the new work began to appear immediately after the publication of the first part. In the newspapers of the day and the leading scientific periodicals the work was acclaimed as a notable contribution to science…”
Buller continued to compile information and began work on a second edition of the History which would be of a larger size than the first and include expanded text and new color plates by Keulemans. “Reviews of the time show that the work was received most enthusiastically, and before the book had been issued finally in bound form (1888) subscribers had ordered the entire edition of 1000 copies.”
One of the major differences in the two editions was in the quality of the lithographs.
It may be of interest to add that the first edition plates, in addition to being fewer than those of the second edition which are reproduced here, [here being the 1967 edition] differ from those of the second in both style and treatment. Keulemans’s work in the first edition was characterized by delicate lines and often exquisite colouring, the hand colouring accentuating the more vivid portions of soft parts and plumage. Connoisseurs of bird illustration who have not already done so would do well to familiarize themselves with the first edition plates.
Buller’s final work was his Supplement of 1905 which contained accumulated species information and, most interestingly, an
exposition of his views on Darwinsim (more especially as illustrated by the New Zealand bird fauna) and comments on bird and forest protection (his enlightened views on the need for forest protection were well in advance of his day.)
From the little I’ve read, Buller’s view on conservation seem to have been complex. Like Audubon and other naturalists of the 19th century he was a hunter and specimen collector. He wrote of this extensively and the 1967 edition of Buller’s Birds actually edits or entirely omits some passages that “would be sure to offend current tastes.” Buller didn’t just shoot birds; he would take them alive when possible and study their behavior in his home. His casual description of the captivity and death of a Little Blue Penguin really did offend my modern, tree-hugging sensibilities (and was edited out of the copy I got from the library). Unfortunately, Buller’s Birds doesn’t include an in-depth discussion of his views on conservation, so it looks like I’ll have to wait until I can read the biography I’ve ordered.
In the meantime I’ll continue reading through the text of Buller’s Birds and enjoying the illustrations of some of my favorite species. All those below courtesy of the New Zealand Electronic Text Centre:
- Chick of the North Island Brown Kiwi
- Huia male (front) and female (rear) – now extinct. Plant: Titoki.
- Tui young (left) and adult (right). Plant: Kowhai.
