![]() Swallow Source: 'Ancient Egypt', Time-Life Books Excerpt |
The swallow The swallow was venerated in the region of Thebes. It was one of the birds the dead wished to be turned into (together with herons and hawks). The Osiris Ani, whose word is truth, saith:- I am a swallow, [I am] a swallow.According to Plutarch Isis flew around the pillar enclosing the coffin of Osiris in the shape of a swallow. Isis nursed the child by giving it her finger to suck instead of her breast, and in the night she would burn away the mortal portions of its body. She herself would turn into a swallow and flit about the pillar with a wailing lament, until the queen who had been watching, when she saw her babe on fire, gave forth a loud cry and thus deprived it of immortality.One of four Demotic texts written on a pot, a literary letter, featured an allegorical swallow and its fruitless revenge against the sea: A letter from the servant Awskj, great of the land of Arabia, before Pharaoh Psamtik Neferpre.
The sparrow |
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![]() Doves, according to J.Bodsworth a Turtle dove on the left and a Rock dove on the right Picture contrasts have been enhanced for better viewing Source: Jon Bodsworth |
Doves Doves were proverbial for their role as prey. Ramses III is described in a Medinet Habu inscription: He rages like the hawk among the birdlets and the dovesPeople also consumed them, as they did with most birds. According to the Harris Papyrus the oblations Ramses III gave to the temple at Karnak included 6510 doves. In the morning the bird noises, among which the cooing of doves was especially insistent, accompanied the waking of people which to a romantic person in love might sound as if the birds were talking to them: The voice of the dove is calling, |
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![]() Hoopoe in acacia tree |
The hoopoe, Upupa epops |
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![]() Kingfisher Relief from Kaemnofret's chapel, 5th dynasty W. S. Smith, Country Life in Ancient Egypt, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, plate 8 |
Two species of kingfishers live along the lower Nile.The Dwarf kingfisher only hibernates in Egypt, unlike the perennial Lesser pied kingfisher which is bigger, reaching about 25 cm. Both species catch fish by hovering above the water and suddenly diving, catching their prey in their beaks.
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![]() Lapwing Source: Jon Bodsworth ![]() Plover Picture contrasts have been enhanced for better viewing Source: Jon Bodsworth |
Plovers and lapwings |
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![]() Senegal Cougal Picture contrasts have been enhanced for better viewing Source: Jon Bodsworth |
Cuckoos Egypt is on the path of the migrating European cuckoo (Cuculus canorus). Two species of cuckoo are indigenous: the great spotted cuckoo (Clamator glandarius) and the slow-flying Senegal cougal (Centropus senegalensis) which lives in the reed thickets of the Delta marshes. | |
![]() Red-rumped Wheatear female ![]() Mourning chat female |
Chats Chats and wheatears prefer to live in dry regions. A number of species of this family live in Egypt: the mourning chat (Oenante lugens), the red-rumped wheatear (Oenante moesta), the hooded wheatear, the white-crowned black wheatear (O.leucopyga) and the Blackstart (Cercomela melanura). A few pass through the country on their migration like Finsch's chat or the Pied wheatear. | |
Partridge Picture contrasts have been enhanced for better viewing Source: Jon Bodsworth |
Partridges The chukar (Alectoris chukar) lives in Asia minor, the Middle East and northern Egypt. It reaches a size of about 33 cm and lives in rocky regions with sparse vegetation.
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