Shakespeare’s Renaissance Wisdom and the Turtle Dove

JF Ptak Science Books LLC  Post 887

Thinking about the second day of Christmas brought me to the turtle dove, and then almost immediately to William Shakespeare, and on to H.W. Seager’s delightful Natural History in Shakespeare's Time being Extracts illustrative of the Subject as he knew it (London, 1896)1.  Seager got to the point right away, quoting the turtle dove’s appearances in Winter’s Tale and Merry Wives before moving on to quote fabulous passages from Bartholomew de Glanvile and Albertus Magnus. 

WINTER'S TALE, iv. 4

FLORIZEL:

“I think you have

As little skill to fear as I have purpose

To put you to't. But, come; our dance, I pray:

Your hand, my Perdita; so turtles pair

That never mean to part.”

MERRY WIVES OF WINDSOR, iii. 3, 44. 

Henry VI, Part IDuke of Burgundy:

“Myself, as far as I could well discern
For smoke and dusky vapours of the night,
Am sure I scared the Dauphin and his trull,
When arm in arm they both came swiftly running,
Like to a pair of loving turtle-doves
That could not live asunder day or night.
After that things are set in order here,
We'll follow them with all the power we have.”

Then on to the 13th century Bartholomew de Glenvile, ostensibly a compendious theologian but who was also a general encyclopaedist who provided one of the widest views on the known natural history of the thirteenth century, drawing together all manner of facts and fictions from Greek, Arab and Jewish sources.  He was translated into English (On the Nature of Things)  and published in a spectacular volume in 1494 following the first printing of the work (Paris) in 1470 (De proprietatibus rerum).
                                                                                                                             
“THE Turtle hath that name of the voice, and is a simple bird as the culvour, but is chaste, far unlike the culvour, and if he loseth his make [i.e., mate], he seeketh not com- pany of any other, but goeth alone, and hath mind of the fellowship that is lost, and groaneth alway, and loveth and chooseth solitary places, and flieth much company of men…”

And this:

“He cometh in springing time and warneth of novelty of time with groaning voice. And in winter he loseth his feathers, and then he hideth him in hollow stocks. And against summer, in springing time, when his feathers spring again, he cometh out of his hole in the which he was hid, and seeketh convenable place and stead for to breed in. The Turtle layeth eggs twice in springing time, and not the third time, but if the first eggs be corrupt. Also the blood of her right wing is medicinable, as the blood of a swallow, and of a culvour or dove.”

And further, describing a magical, fireproofing stone that could be found in the mouth of the Turtle Dove: 

“Amatides is a precious stone ; if a cloth be touched therewith, the cloth withstandeth fire and burneth not, though it be put therein ; but it receiveth brightness and seemeth the more clear. And withstandeth all evil doing of witches…IT is supposed that in the maw of the cock Turtle-dove this stone is to be found, and hath virtue to increase concord and love…” 

And from “Albertus Magnus” (though probably by a follower of his), The Book of Secrets: Of the Virtues of Herbs, Stones, and Certain Beats, Also a Book of the Marvels of the World, the use of the Turtle Dove’s heart: 

“IF the heart of a Turtle-dove be worn in the skin of a wolf, the wearer will never thenceforth be wanton. If its heart be burnt, and put on the eggs of any bird, never will it be possible that they should be hatched. And if its feet be hung on a tree, from thenceforth it will not bear fruit.  And if a hairy place be anointed with its blood, and the water in which a mole has been boiled, the black hairs will fall off."  

Notes:
Seager’s work was meant to be a polite background to the natural history of the time, and not an exhaustive treatise.  He says in the preface: “this book presents in a convenient form for reference a collection of the quaint theories about Natural History accepted by Shakespeare and his contemporaries. The work is meant to be rather a sketch than an exhaustive treatise, otherwise it would fill many volumes. The plan of the book is to give some illustration of each word mentioned by Shakespeare when there is anything remarkable to be noted about it. The term " Natural History " has been taken in its widest sense, as including not only fauna but flora, as well as some precious stones…”