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Cuculi.
Cuckoos
XIX.
Ruricolas agreste genus plerique cuculos
Cur vocitent, quaenam prodita causa fuit?[1]
Vere novo cantat Coccyx, quo tempore vites
Qui non absolvit iure notatur iners.
Fert ova in nidos alienos, qualiter ille
Cui thalamum prodit uxor adulterio.
Whatever explanation has been given for the custom of calling country-dwellers, that rustic race, ‘cuckoos’? - When spring is new, the cuckoo calls, and anyone who has not pruned his vines by this time is rightly blamed for being idle. The cuckoo desposits its eggs in other birds’ nests, like the man on whose account a wife betrays her marriage bed in adultery.
1. See Pliny, Natural History, 18.66.249, and Horace, Satires, 1.7.31, for the use of the word ‘cuckoo’ as term of mockery for the idle man who has failed to finish pruning his vines before the cuckoo is heard calling.
Related Emblems
Hide related emblems- Declaracion magistral sobre las Emblemas de Andres Alciato (1615), Najera: CUCULI. | Open in other pane
- Emblemata (1621), Padua: Cuculi. | Open in other pane
- Emblematum libellus (1546), Venice: Cuculi. | Open in other pane
- Los Emblemas (1549), Lyon: Cu Cu. | Open in other pane
- Emblemata (1550), Lyon: Cuculi. | Open in other pane
- Emblemata (1551), Lyon: Cuculi. | Open in other pane
- Toutes les emblemes (1558), Lyon: Les Coquuz. | Open in other pane
- Liber emblematum ... Kunstbuch (1567), Franckfurt am Main: Cuculi. Geuch | Open in other pane
- Emblemata (1591), Leiden: Cuculi. | Open in other pane
- Diverse imprese (1551), Lyon: Quello, che dinota questa voce Cucù. | Open in other pane
- Emblemes (1549), Lyons: Les Coquuz. | Open in other pane
- Emblemata / Les emblemes (1584), Paris: Cuculi. Les Coucuz. | Open in other pane
- Les emblemes (1615), Geneva/Cologny: Les coquus. | Open in other pane
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Iconclass Keywords
Relating to the image:
Relating to the text:
- spring, 'Ver'; 'Primavera' (Ripa) [23D42] Search | Browse Iconclass
- audible means of communication of animal(s): roaring, crying, singing, etc. [25F(+49)] Search | Browse Iconclass
- birds (+ nest, den, burrow) [25F3(+421)] Search | Browse Iconclass
- other birds: cuckoo [25F39(CUCKOO)] Search | Browse Iconclass
- nest, den, burrow [34(+9421)] Search | Browse Iconclass
- 'Adulterio' (Ripa) [42D390] Search | Browse Iconclass
- farmers [46A14] Search | Browse Iconclass
- pruning [47I135] Search | Browse Iconclass
- vine [47I422] Search | Browse Iconclass
- Idleness; 'Otio' (Ripa) [54DD2] Search | Browse Iconclass
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