Bird Gods in Ancient Europe 



It is a bird that devours vast quantities of 

 hairy caterpillars, which are rejected by most 

 insect-eating creatures. It may be doubted, 

 however, whether this good trait had much 

 to do with the admiration for the cuckoo 

 among early men. 



In Ireland, as in Finland and Esthland, 

 there were cuckoo demigods. They are not 

 only of preternatural strength and agility, but 

 subject to periods of apathy, attributed either 

 to fairy blight, or — what tells the story of the 

 meaning of these things the plainest — the 

 " couvade." In the discovery of the im- 

 portance of the bird gods in the eyes of early 

 peoples and in the connection of the "couvade" 

 with demigods and heroes, clearly birdlike in 

 their main traits, we have the long-sought 

 clew to the mystery. We may guess that it 

 began with the observation that male birds 

 assisted in the brooding of the eggs. After 

 a stage in which the father was treated like 

 the mother before the birth, it came to the 



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