Cultural references to chickens
There are numerous cultural references to chickens, in myth, folklore and religion, in language and in literature.
In Classical Antiquity
In ancient Greece, chickens were not normally used for sacrifices, perhaps because they were still considered an exotic animal. Because of its valor, the cock is found as an attribute of Ares, Heracles, and Athena. The alleged last words of Socrates as he died from hemlock poisoning, as recounted by Plato, were "Crito, I owe a cock to Asclepius; will you remember to pay the debt?", signifying that death was a cure for the illness of life.
The term "Persian bird" for the rooster appears to have been given by the Greeks after Persian contact "because of his great importance and his religious use among the Persians".[1]
The Greeks believed that even lions were afraid of roosters. Several of Aesop's Fables reference this belief. The poet Cratinus (mid-5th century BC, according to the later Greek author Athenaeus) calls the chicken "the Persian alarm". In Aristophanes's comedy The Birds (414 BC) a chicken is called "the Median bird", which points to an introduction from the East. Pictures of chickens are found on Greek red figure and black-figure pottery.
In ancient Greece, chickens were still rare and were a rather prestigious food for symposia.[2] Delos seems to have been a center of chicken breeding (Columella, De Re Rustica 8.3.4). "About 3200 BC chickens were common in Sindh. After the attacks of Aria people these fowls spred from Sindh to Balakh and Iran. During attacks and wars between Iranian and Greeks the chickens of Hellanic breed came in Iran and about 1000 BC Hellanic chickens came into Sindh through Medan".[3]
The Romans used chickens for oracles, both when flying ("ex avibus", Augury) and when feeding ("auspicium ex tripudiis", Alectryomancy). The hen ("gallina") gave a favourable omen ("auspicium ratum"), when appearing from the left (Cic., de Div. ii.26), like the crow and the owl.
For the oracle "ex tripudiis" according to Cicero (Cic. de Div. ii.34), any bird could be used in auspice, and shows at one point that any bird could perform the tripudium[4] but normally only chickens ("pulli") were consulted. The chickens were cared for by the pullarius, who opened their cage and fed them pulses or a special kind of soft cake when an augury was needed. If the chickens stayed in their cage, made noises ("occinerent"), beat their wings or flew away, the omen was bad; if they ate greedily, the omen was good.[5]
In 249 BC, the Roman general Publius Claudius Pulcher had his "sacred chickens" "[6] thrown overboard when they refused to feed before the battle of Drepana, saying "If they won't eat, perhaps they will drink." He promptly lost the battle against the Carthaginians and 93 Roman ships were sunk. Back in Rome, he was tried for impiety and heavily fined.[7]
In 162 BC, the Lex Faunia forbade fattening hens on grain which was a measure enacted to reduce the demand for grain.[8] To get around this, the Romans castrated roosters (capon), which resulted in a doubling of size[8]: 305 despite the law that was passed in Rome that forbade the consumption of fattened chickens. It was renewed a number of times, but does not seem to have been successful. Fattening chickens with bread soaked in milk was thought to give especially delicious results. The Roman gourmet Apicius offers 17 recipes for chicken, mainly boiled chicken with a sauce. All parts of the animal are used: the recipes include the stomach, liver, testicles and even the pygostyle (the fatty "tail" of the chicken where the tail feathers attach).
The Roman author Columella gives advice on chicken breeding in the eighth book of his treatise, De Re Rustica (On Agriculture). He identified Tanagrian, Rhodic, Chalkidic and Median (commonly misidentified as Melian) breeds, which have an impressive appearance, a quarrelsome nature and were used for cockfighting by the Greeks (De Re Rustica 8.3.4). For farming, native (Roman) chickens are to be preferred, or a cross between native hens and Greek cocks (De Re Rustica 8.2.13). Dwarf chickens are nice to watch because of their size but have no other advantages.
According to Columella (De Re Rustica 8.2.7), the ideal flock consists of 200 birds, which can be supervised by one person if someone is watching for stray animals. White chickens should be avoided as they are not very fertile and are easily caught by eagles or goshawks. One cock should be kept for five hens. In the case of Rhodian and Median cocks that are very heavy and therefore not much inclined to sex, only three hens are kept per cock. The hens of heavy fowls are not much inclined to brood; therefore their eggs are best hatched by normal hens. A hen can hatch no more than 15-23 eggs, depending on the time of year, and supervise no more than 30 hatchlings. Eggs that are long and pointed give more male hatchlings, rounded eggs mainly female hatchlings (De Re Rustica 8.5.11).
Columella also states that chicken coops should face southeast and lie adjacent to the kitchen, as smoke is beneficial for the animals and "poultry never thrive so well as in warmth and smoke" (De Re Rustica 8.3.1).[9] Coops should consist of three rooms and possess a hearth. Dry dust or ash should be provided for dust-baths.
According to Columella (De Re Rustica 8.4.1), chickens should be fed on barley groats, small chick-peas, millet and wheat bran, if they are cheap. Wheat itself should be avoided as it is harmful to the birds. Boiled ryegrass (Lolium sp.) and the leaves and seeds of alfalfa (Medicago sativa L.) can be used as well. Grape marc can be used, but only when the hens stop laying eggs, that is, about the middle of November; otherwise eggs are small and few. When feeding grape marc, it should be supplemented with some bran. Hens start to lay eggs after the winter solstice, in warm places around the first of January, in colder areas in the middle of February. Parboiled barley increases their fertility; this should be mixed with alfalfa leaves and seeds, or vetches or millet if alfalfa is not at hand. Free-ranging chickens should receive two cups of barley daily.
Columella[10] advises farmers to slaughter hens that are older than three years, those that aren't productive or are poor care-takers of their eggs, and particularly those that eat their own and other hens' eggs.
According to Aldrovandi, capons were produced by burning "the hind part of the bowels, or loins or spurs"[11] with a hot iron. The wound was treated with potter's chalk.
In religion and mythology
Since antiquity chickens have been, and still are, a sacred animal in some cultures[12] and deeply embedded within belief systems and religious worship.
In Indonesia the chicken has great significance during the Hindu cremation ceremony. A chicken is considered a channel for evil spirits which may be present during the ceremony. A chicken is tethered by the leg and kept present at the ceremony for its duration to ensure that any evil spirits present go into the chicken and not the family members. The chicken is then taken home and returns to its normal life.
In the New Testament, Jesus prophesied the betrayal by Peter: "Jesus answered, 'I tell you, Peter, before the rooster crows today, you will deny three times that you know me.'"[13] It happened,[14] and Peter cried bitterly. This made the rooster a symbol for both vigilance and betrayal.
Earlier, Jesus compares himself to a mother hen when talking about Jerusalem: "O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing."[15]
In the sixth century, Pope Gregory I declared the rooster the emblem of Christianity[16] and another Papal enactment of the ninth century by Pope Nicholas I[12] ordered the figure of the rooster to be placed on every church steeple.[17]
In many Central European folk tales, the devil is believed to flee at the first crowing of a rooster.
In traditional Jewish practice, a kosher animal is swung around the head and then slaughtered on the afternoon before Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, in a ritual called kapparos; it is now common practice to cradle the bird and move him or her around the head. A chicken or fish is typically used because it is commonly available (and small enough to hold). The sacrifice of the animal is to receive atonement, for the animal symbolically takes on all the person's sins in kapparos. The meat is then donated to the poor. A woman brings a hen for the ceremony, while a man brings a rooster. Although not a sacrifice in the biblical sense, the death of the animal reminds the penitent sinner that his or her life is in God's hands.
The Talmud speaks of learning "courtesy toward one's mate" from the rooster.[18] This might refer to the fact that when a rooster finds something good to eat, he calls his hens to eat first. A rooster might also come to the aid of a hen if she is attacked. The Talmud likewise provides us with the statement "Had the Torah not been given to us, we would have learned modesty from cats, honest toil from ants, chastity from doves and gallantry from cocks",[19][20] which may be further understood as to that of the gallantry of cocks being taken in the context of a religious instilling vessel of "a girt one of the loins" (Young's Literal Translation) that which is "stately in his stride" and "move with stately bearing" in the Book of Proverbs 30:29-31 as referenced by Michael V. Fox in his Proverbs 10-31 where Saʻadiah ben Yosef Gaon (Saadia Gaon) identifies the definitive trait of "A cock girded about the loins" in Proverbs 30:31 (Douay–Rheims Bible) as "the honesty of their behavior and their success",[21] identifying a spiritual purpose of a religious vessel within that religious instilling schema of purpose and use.
The chicken is one of the symbols of the Chinese Zodiac. In Chinese folk religion, a cooked chicken as a religious offering is usually limited to ancestor veneration and worship of village deities. Vegetarian deities such as the Buddha are not recipients of such offerings. Under some observations, an offering of chicken is presented with "serious" prayer (while roasted pork is offered during a joyous celebration). In Confucian Chinese weddings, a chicken can be used as a substitute for one who is seriously ill or not available (e.g., sudden death) to attend the ceremony. A red silk scarf is placed on the chicken's head and a close relative of the absent bride/groom holds the chicken so the ceremony may proceed. However, this practice is rare today.
A cockatrice was supposed to have been born from an egg laid by a rooster, as well as killed by a rooster's call.[citation needed]
References
- ^ Peters, John P. (1913). "The Cock". Journal of the American Oriental Society. 33: 363–396. doi:10.2307/592841. JSTOR 592841. Archived from the original on 25 February 2017. Retrieved 26 November 2015.
- ^ Columella, Lucius Junius Moderatus (1941). On agriculture, with a recension of the text and an English translation by Harrison Boyd Ash. Robarts - University of Toronto. Cambridge Harvard University Press. p. 355. Archived from the original on 8 April 2018. Retrieved 30 January 2018.
- ^ Jull, Morley A (1938). Poultry husbandry. McGraw-Hill Book Company. pp. 2–3. OCLC 929679064.
- ^ A classical and archaeological dictionary of the manners, customs, laws, institutions, arts, etc. of the celebrated nations of antiquity, and of the middle ages: To which is prefixed A synoptical and chronological view of ancient history Archived 23 June 2016 at the Wayback Machine P. Austin Nuttall – Printed for Whittaker and co., 1840 – page 601
- ^ ltd, Chambers W. and R. (13 March 2019). "Chambers's information for the people, ed. by W. and R. Chambers". p. 458. Archived from the original on 13 September 2016. Retrieved 13 March 2019 – via Google Books.
- ^ McKeown, J. C. (1 June 2010). A Cabinet of Roman Curiosities: Strange Tales and Surprising Facts from the World's Greatest Empire. Oxford University Press. p. 131. ISBN 9780199752782. Archived from the original on 12 September 2016. Retrieved 13 March 2019 – via Google Books.
- ^ Paul Sheridan (8 November 2015). "The Sacred Chickens of Rome". Anecdotesfromantiquity.net. Archived from the original on 17 November 2015. Retrieved 17 November 2015.
- ^ a b Toussaint-Samat, Maguelonne (25 March 2009). A History of Food. John Wiley & Sons. p. 305. ISBN 9781444305142. Archived from the original on 13 September 2016. Retrieved 13 March 2019 – via Google Books.
- ^ "The New England Farmer". Thomas W. Shepard. 13 March 2019. p. 69. Archived from the original on 13 September 2016. Retrieved 13 March 2019 – via Google Books.
- ^ ES Forster, EH Heffner (1954). On agriculture, volume II: books 5–9. The Loeb Classical Library: Harvard University Press. p. 355. ISBN 978-0674994485.
- ^ Birkhead, Tim (13 March 2019). The Wisdom of Birds: An Illustrated History of Ornithology. Bloomsbury. p. 278. ISBN 9780747598220. Archived from the original on 13 September 2016. Retrieved 13 March 2019 – via Google Books.
- ^ a b Adler, Jerry; Lawler, Andrew (June 2012). "How the Chicken Conquered the World". Smithsonian. Archived from the original on 3 November 2012. Retrieved 24 May 2012.
- ^ Luke 22:34
- ^ Luke 22:61
- ^ Matthew 23:37; also Luke 13:34. For a recent study of chickens in the New Testament, see Joshua N. Tilton "Chickens and the Cultural Context of the Gospels Archived August 8, 2014, at the Wayback Machine" www.jerusalemperspective.com Archived 2 August 2014 at the Wayback Machine.
- ^ The Antiquary: a magazine devoted to the study of the past, Volume 17 edited by Edward Walford, John Charles Cox, George Latimer Apperson – page 202
- ^ The Philadelphia Museum bulletin, Volumes 1-5, Pennsylvania Museum of Art, Pennsylvania Museum and School of Industrial Art, p 14, 1906
- ^ Eruvin 100b.
- ^ A Treasury of Jewish Quotations By Joseph L. Baron – 1985
- ^ Jonathan ben Nappaha. Talmud: Erubin 100b
- ^ Fox, Michael V. (2008). Proverbs 10-31: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary. Yale University Press. ISBN 978-0-300-14209-9.[page needed]