CHAPTER LI THE ROOK OR DAW-LA POLA THE author of the oldest Provençal poem at present known,1 having possibly mistaken an uncial Q in his manuscript of Boethius for an uncial A, read avibus instead of quibus, and then proceeded to describe how Boethius beheld a hundred thousand birds mounting a ladder toward heaven. Some (the souls of those who had sinned too deeply) had to come down again; but the virtuous, having risen to ℗, the mystic letter at the top of the ladder beheld by Boethius on the gown of Damosel Philosophy, are redeemed, and, changing hue, become beloved of the Damosel.2 Though it may be that Dante neither made the same error, nor yet knew any version of the Provençal poem, it nevertheless is true that in the Seventh Heaven the poet, accompanied by Beatrice (the embodiment of Theology), beheld a heavenly ladder on which angels were descending. No 1 Text in PAUL MEYER'S Recueil, pp. 23-32. Choix. II, pp. 4-39. 2 The misread sentence in Boethius is this: Atque inter utrasque litteras in scalarum modum gradus quidam insigniti videbantur, quibus ab inferiore ad superius elementum esset adscensus. 'And between the two letters [seen on the gown of Philosophy] some steps like those of ladders were clearly seen, whereon the ascent was made from the lower to the higher element.' For this explanation of the birds in the Provençal Boethius, see article by HOFMANN, Quellen des ältesten provenzalischen Gedichtes, in the Sitzungsberichte of the Munich Acad. of Sciences, 1870, pp. 176–177. doubt this is Jacob's ladder; yet in the background of the poet's memory there may have been another idea a reminiscence, perhaps, of the Provençal Boethius, or of some similar poem. Though to Dante's mind those who descended the ladder were beaming angels, they suggest to him an image of the flight of rooks at dawn. Di color d'oro, in che raggio traluce, 1 See Genesis xxviii, 12. 2 Pole, now obsolete in Tuscan save in a proverb, is used by the Venetians (so G. di Mirafiore says) to designate a taccola or daw. Benvenuto da Imola renders, 'the magpie or something similar,' 'le pole, quæ sunt de genere picarum.' Lubin, Fraticelli, and Scartazzini say 'cornacchie'; Giuseppe Campi says 'cornacchia,' 'mulacchia'; Andreoli, 'dette anche mulacchie e più comunemente cornacchie. Philalethes translates 'Krähn.' In my opinion the word pola is derived from cornix paula, as sanglier, by the same wellknown dropping of the noun, is derived from porcus singularis. Cornix paula = cornicula or, rather cornacula, whence cornacchia. No etymology for pola is registered in KöRTING, LateinischRomanisches Wörterbuch, 2d ed. As to the meaning of pola, the following definitions are given: cornacchia, mulacchia, taccola, and, finally, in his Opere Div. 90, Franc. Sacchetti attributes to the pola essentially the characteristics attributed by the 'Physiologus' to the upupa, hoopoe or lapwing. The weight of testimony indicates that the bird is either the rook or the daw. The word pola seems to have had more than one owner in Dante's time. * Poi altre vanno via senza ritorno, Coloured like gold on which the sunshine gleams, Likewise beheld I down the steps descending LONGFELLOW. Hard though it be for the unelated sceptic of these days even for a moment to force into the mind's eye any vision of these variously moving angelic 'splendours,' the image from nature has all the undiminished beauty of truth. Rooks and daws are not, however, the only birds that shake the chilly wetness out of their feathers at dawn. In the second song of Helgi, Sigrun utters her joy over her well-beloved husband by comparing it to the joy felt by Odin's hawks, when, at early 1 Parad. XXI, 28-42. dawn, they sit in the wood, dripping with dew. 'Nu,' she cries, 'em ek svâ fegin sem atfrekir Odin's haukar, er döglitir dagsbrûn sîa!' (Now I am as happy as Odin's greedy hawks, when, dripping with dew, they see the brow of day.)1 ... So, in a passage read by Dante,2 Virgil tells how the rook, soaked by showers, calls out harshly, and hovers about alone over the dry sand. And Selby describes how starlings, 'before they retire to rest, . . . perform various manœuvres in the air, the whole frequently describing rapid revolutions around a common centre. This peculiar flight will sometimes continue for nearly an hour before they become finally settled for the night. Upon the approach of spring they spread themselves over the whole country.'3 There is a certain likeness between Dante's phrase and Virgil's, but a likeness forced by nature; for if two men observe nature understandingly in any single phenomenon, the result of their observation is destined to be similar in tone, if not in the mere accident of words. If there be one simile in Dante for which he owes no debt, it is this lively description of the chilly rooks shaking themselves to get some warming blood into their wings, then wheeling and flying away, or settling down in the same spot, as they happen to be inclined, a di 1 Cited by LUNING, Die Natur in der altgermanischen und mittel hochdeutschen Epik, p. 171. 2 Cf. EDW. MOORE, Studies in Dante, First Series, p. 344. 'Tum cornix plena pluvium vocat improba voce, Et sola in sicca secum spatiatur harena,' Georg. I, 388-389. In WHITE'S Nat. Hist. of Selborne, note by editor to letter XLVIII. versity of purpose and of actions entirely at variance with our author's dogma that all animals of the same species act in a uniform manner.1 No, it is hardly the dogmatist that is speaking here, but rather the poet who rebuked those sterile rimesters, Bonagiunta of Lucca, the Notary, and Guittone of Arezzo, in these majestic verses: One am I, who, whenever Love doth inspire me, note, and in that measure It is from nature alone that we can get new images, new truths. All else seems mere cobwebs and dust. To think of Dante in some cold, wet grove or wood at dawn, watching keenly every movement of these birds as they bestir themselves for the business of another day, certainly starts a new train of speculation. 1 See De V. E. I, ii, 36-37. 2 Purg. XXIV, 52–54. |