Research source

THE CUCKOO, THE HERON, THE HEATHCOCK, THE PARTRIDGE, THE NIGHTINGALE, THE SWALLOW, THE SPARROW, AND

Date of account: English edition published 1872
Source: Zoological Mythology; or, The Legends of Animals, Volume 2 (of 2)
Reference: Zoological Mythology; or, The Legends of Animals, Volume 2 (of 2) · selected passage 136
Rights: public_domain
Language: English
Record updated: 2026-08-25

Record summary

We have already seen the nightingale and the stag as images representing the moon; here we also find a crab as a lunar figure

Published source text

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Source passage

Source text · mention only

We have already seen the nightingale and the stag as images representing the moon; here we also find a crab as a lunar figure. The moon is the watcher of night; either it sleeps with its eyes open like the hare, or it is watchful like the stag, or, as a nightingale, it justifies the Greek proverb of the watchers who sleep less than the nightingales (oud' hoson Aêdones üpnôousin), or, as crab, it wakens up with its claws those who are asleep and menaced by any danger.[505] In Pliny we find the nightingale, the stag, and the crab in concord; he informs us that crab's eyes, with the nightingale's flesh, tied up in a stag's skin, are useful to keep a man awake. The moon, in fact, not only herself watches, but makes men watch, or prolong their vigils; we know, moreover, of the excitement with which her presence agitates the quail, which cannot sleep when the moon shines in the sky. Pliny also recommends the river-crab, cut in pieces and drunk, as a remedy against any poison, but especially against the venom projected by the toad. In the _Heisterbac. Hist.

Historical context

Contextual commentary · mention only

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Modern context

Contextual commentary · mention only

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