Bird Gods in Ancient Europe 



her indifference, follows closely his beloved. 

 So the bird is by its nature and habits well 

 fitted to be the attendant and symbol of love 

 and the goddess of love — better fitted indeed 

 than the sparrow, which is sometimes given to 

 Venus, because of its demonstrative amative- 

 ness, but, owing to its quarrelsome disposition, 

 is much less appropriate than the dove. It is 

 the gentle disposition of the dove that may 

 have helped to influence the earliest Christians 

 to make use of the dove as a symbol of peace 

 and good-will to men, in contrast to the rapa- 

 cious bird of Jove and the sinister, bloodthirsty- 

 little attendant on Minerva. But neither the 

 early Christian use of the dove as an emblem, 

 nor the pagan way of placing it as a symbol 

 beside Venus, explains to satisfaction what such 

 an alliance meant. 



There is mournfulness in the cry of the dove 

 and there was a funereal use of the dove as a 

 symbol of mourning, if not distinctly of the life 

 beyond the grave. Aphrodite herself and the 



