Happy Holidays (in general) and Merry Christmas (in particular as it is actually Christmas day) everyone! Please regard this as a quasi-open thread. I had more ambitious plans for this diary but my cold unexpectedly got worse yesterday and I kind of ran out of steam. Please excuse its rather rudimentary nature and feel free to discuss anything birdy and/or Christmasy in the comments.
Most of you are probably familiar with the idea of a Christmas bird count in which birders go out on a specific day in late December or early January and try and count all the birds they can find in their assigned area. I have participated in CBCs a couple of times. This diary is about counting birds at Chistmas but in a different context.
Most of you are probably familiar with the christmas carol, the Twelve Days of Christmas in which the singer’s ‘true love’ gives the singer an increasing number of gifts per day. On 6 of the 12 days (1-4, 6, and 7) the gifts are birds. If you are a conscientious lover of animals you know you shouldn’t give pets as gifts so what gives? Why all the bird gifts? And why all the counting?
The song in its modern form dates to 1909 when music and standard lyrics were published. The first published lyrics are from 1780 in a book for children. Hypotheses about the origin of the lyrics varies. The most common interpretations are either that the song is derived from a children’s memory game or it was device to teach children elements of the catholic faith during the period when practicing catholicism was banned in Britain.
According to this, admittedly speculative, document all 12 days were actually originally represented by birds in preChristian British culture. Others have suggested that the five golden rings (originally five gold rings) refer to ring-necked pheasants thus making gifts 1-7 all birds. The author suggests that all 12 gifts were birds, symbols of fertility. Hey, it’s on the internet so it’s got to be true. I will note that in Wikipedia’s chart showing variation in the song from various sources in the 19th and early 20th century that the first seven gifts (the birds) are pretty much the same while the last five gifts are much more variable from version to version.
One problem with the ancient birds as symbols of fertility hypothesis for the song is that several of the birds such as the french hens and the pheasants were probably not around in ancient Britain.
Anyway here are the 12 birds of Christmas from the source above.
12. (European) Cuckoo. I think his case for this one is the weakest.
11. Lapwing. A bird that dances.
10. Rooster. One of the variant lyrics has “ten cocks a’crowing”
9. Snipe. A bird that drums.
8. Magpie. A bird colored somewhat like the cow the milkmaids would be milking.
7. Swan
6. Goose.
5. Ring-necked Pheasant
4. Colley birds (an all black bird such as raven)
3. French hens
2. Turtle Doves
1. Partridge.
Anyway that’s my Christmas bird count.