Bird Gods in Ancient Europe 



in 1644 Johann Gutsloff gives the prayer of 

 an old Esthonian farmer : " Beloved Picker, 

 we will sacrifice to thee an ox with two horns 

 and four hoofs, and want to beg you as to our 

 ploughing and sowing that our straw shall be 

 red as copper and our grain as yellow as gold. 

 Send elsewhither all black thick clouds over 

 great swamps, high woods and wide wastes ! 

 But give to us ploughmen and sowers a fertile 

 season and sweet rain." 



In Finnish and Esthonian pikker is no 

 longer used to designate the woodpecker, per- 

 haps because when a word is once used for 

 a god it becomes dangerous and is gradually 

 dropped in its ordinary meaning. At present 

 tikka holds its place. Or else in the course of 

 time the initial p has given place to /, as we 

 shall find that the Greeks seem to have re- 

 ceived the foreign name of the peacock with 

 that bird and changed the initial from p to /. 



In the Kalevala the god of the woods Tapio 

 IS the old bird god represented by, perhaps 



