(1831–1889)
In folklore and mythology (1733–1795) In Ancient Greece and Rome, several myths about crows and jackdaws included: • An ancient Greek and Roman adage, told by
Erasmus runs, "The swans will sing when the jackdaws are silent," meaning that educated or wise people will speak after the foolish become quiet. • The Roman poet
Ovid saw the crow as a harbinger of rain (
Amores 2,6, 34). •
Pliny noted how the
Thessalians,
Illyrians, and
Lemnians cherished jackdaws for destroying grasshoppers' eggs. The
Veneti are fabled to have bribed the jackdaws to spare their crops. • In Greek legend, princess
Arne was bribed with gold by King
Minos of Crete and was punished for her avarice by being transformed into an equally avaricious jackdaw, which still seeks shiny things. In the
Bible account at 1 Kings 17:6, ravens are credited with providing Elijah with food. '' by
Arthur Rackham In
Australian Aboriginal mythology,
Crow is a
trickster,
culture hero, and ancestral being. Legends relating to Crow have been observed in various Aboriginal language groups and cultures across Australia; these commonly include stories relating to Crow's role in the theft of fire, the origin of death, and the killing of Eagle's son. Crows are mentioned often in
Buddhism, especially
Tibetan disciplines. The Dharmapala (protector of the Dharma)
Mahakala is represented by a crow in one of his physical/earthly forms. In the
Chaldean myth the
Epic of Gilgamesh,
Utnapishtim releases a
dove and raven to find land; however, the dove merely circles and returns. Only then does Utnapishtim send forth the raven, which does not return, and Utnapishtim concludes the raven has found land. In
Chinese mythology, the world originally had 10 suns either spiritually embodied as 10 crows and/or carried by 10 crows; when all 10 decided to rise at once, the effect was devastating to crops, so the gods sent their greatest archer
Houyi, who shot down nine crows and spared only one. In
Denmark, the night raven is considered an exorcised spirit. A hole in its left wing denotes where the stake used to exorcise it was driven into the earth. He who looks through the hole will become a night raven himself. In
Hinduism, crows are thought of as carriers of information that give omens to people regarding their situations. For example, when a crow crows in front of a person's house, the resident is expected to have special visitors that day. Also, in Hindu literature, crows have great memories which they use to give information. Symbolism is associated with the crow in the Hindu faith. On a positive note, crows are often associated with worship of ancestors because they are believed to be embodying the souls of the recently deceased. However, many other associations with crows are seen in Hinduism. Crows are believed to be connected with both the gods and goddesses, particularly the controversial ones such as Sani, the god of the planet
Saturn, who uses a crow as his vehicle. In Hindu astrology, it is said that one who has the effect of Sani in their horoscope are angered easily, and may be unable to take control of their futures, but are extremely intelligent at the same time. Thus the presence of a crow, the vehicle of Sani is believed to have similar effects on the homes it lays its eyes on. Whether these effects are positive or negative is a source of debate in Hinduism. Crows are also considered ancestors in Hinduism and during
Śrāddha, the practice of offering food or
pinda to crows is still in vogue. Crows are associated with
Dhumavati the form of mother goddess that invokes quarrel and fear. Crows are also fed during the fifteen day period of
Pitru Paksha, which occurs in the autumn season, as an offering and sacrifice to the ancestors. During the time of Pitra Paksha, it is believed that the ancestors descend on Earth from pitra-loka, and are able to eat food offered to them by the means of a crow. This can also occur during the time of
Kumbha, many Hindus prepare entire vegetarian meals that are eaten solely by the crows and other birds. In
Irish mythology, crows are associated with
Morrigan, the goddess of war and death. In Islam, the Surat
Al-Ma'ida of the Qur'an describes the story of how the crow teaches the son of Adam to cover the dead body of his brother: "Then Allah sent a crow digging a grave in the ground for a dead crow, in order to show him how to bury the corpse of his brother. He cried, 'Alas! Have I even failed to be like this crow and bury the corpse of my brother?' So he became regretful." In
Japanese mythology, a
three-legged crow called is depicted. In
Korean mythology, a
three-legged crow is known as
Samjokgo (hangul: 삼족오; hanja: 三足烏). In
Norse mythology,
Huginn and Muninn are a pair of common ravens that range the entire world,
Midgard, bringing the god
Odin information. In
Sweden, ravens are held to be the ghosts of murdered men. In
Welsh mythology, the god
Brân the Blessed – whose name means "crow" or "raven"—is associated with corvids and death; tradition holds that Bran's severed head is buried under the
Tower of London, facing France—a possible genesis for the practice of keeping ravens in the Tower, said to protect the fortunes of Britain. In
Cornish folklore, crows—
magpies particularly—are associated with death and the "other world", and must be greeted respectfully. The origin of "counting crows" as
augury is British; however, the British version rather is to "count magpies"—their black and white
pied colouring alluding to the realms of the living and dead. In
some Native American mythologies, especially those in the Pacific Northwest, the raven is seen as both the Creator of the World and, separately, a trickster god. According to
Landnámabók, a mythological account on the discovery of
Iceland, Hrafna-Flóki is supposed to have used three ravens to scout for land around 860-870 CE when he came across the island. Experts debate whether the account is historical or mythological. In medieval times, crows were thought to live abnormally long lives. They were also thought to be monogamous throughout their long lives. They were thought to predict the future, anticipate rain and reveal ambushes. Crows were also thought to lead flocks of storks while they crossed the sea to Asia.
In popular culture Literature •
The Raven by
Edgar Allan Poe details a raven extensively being sent by a woman
Lenore, followed by conflict between the raven and the narrator • In ''
Aesop's Fables'', the jackdaw embodies stupidity in one tale (by starving while waiting for figs on a fig tree to ripen), vanity in another (the jackdaw sought to become king of the birds with borrowed feathers, but was shamed when they fell off), and cunning in yet another (the crow comes up to a pitcher and knows that his beak is too short to reach the water, and if he tips it over, all the water will fall out, so the crow places pebbles in the pitcher so the water rises and he can reach it to relieve his thirst). • In
Ovid's
Metamorphoses, in
Greek mythology, the god
Apollo became enraged when the
crow or raven exposed his lover
Coronis' tryst with a mortal, his ire transmuting the bird's feathers from white to black. • In the
Story of Bhusunda, a chapter of the
Yoga Vasistha, a very old sage in the form of a crow, Bhusunda, recalls a succession of epochs in the Earth's history, as described in
Hindu cosmology. He survived several destructions, living on a
wish-fulfilling tree on
Mount Meru. •
The Crow, a comic book series by
James O'Barr, adapted into two films;
The Crow (1994), and
The Crow (2024).
Organizations with raven logo • The
Farm Labor Organizing Committee uses a raven as its logo, with top red and bottom black
colors for its logo
Music • Both ravens and crows have commonly featured in the lyrics of
heavy metal songs. A 2019 study showed that ravens are the most frequent birds mentioned in heavy metal lyrics, while crows are the fourth (
eagles and
vultures being the second and third). ==See also==