Bird Gods in Ancient Europe 



woodpecker. Pandion " Pan the god" was, as 

 presently we shall see, alternately the eagle, 

 peacock or cuckoo. 



Tereus Woodpecker first marries Philomela 

 Nightingale, and then, tiring of her, persuades 

 Pandion (his father-in-law) and Procne Swal- 

 low (his sister-in-law) that Philomela is dead ; 

 whereupon he gets also Swallow to wife. On 

 the journey home Woodpecker cuts out Swal- 

 low's tongue so that she may never tell of his 

 crime when she discovers that her sister is still 

 alive. Whence it followed that the swallow 

 from that time forth could only make twitter- 

 ing noises like barbarians — the Greeks said 

 that barbarians did not speak, they twittered. 



When we consider Lemminkainen and II- 

 marinen in the poetry of Finiand we find this 

 story again, with the cuckoo, not the wood- 

 pecker, as the villain of the play. 



The wondersmith Ilmarinen, whose first wife 

 was slain through the malice of Kullervo, goes 

 again to Pohjola to woo her sister. But the 

 4 49 



