275
either thought to have vanished or are down to as few as ten individuals, as in the
case of the Mauritius (Echo) Parakeet, the world’s rarest surviving parrot in
the wild.
21
29.3 In Memoriam of the Birds
In 1930 Colonel R. Meinertzhagen, working under the authority of the Egyptian
Government, published his two-volume Nicoll’s Birds of Egypt,
22
the first survey of
its kind since poet Percy Bysshe Shelley’s distant relative, George Shelley, published his own A Handbook to the Birds of Egypt in 1872. Devoting a considerable
section to “The Birds Of Ancient Egypt” (written by R. E. Moreau) and representing
images of birds carved into a tomb at Saqqara, a mural of the Griffon Vulture from
Thebes, a pelican drawing from the Tomb of Mera, of a mallard from the Tomb of
Tehuti Hetep, a swan from the Tomb of Ptahhotep, a night heron from the Tomb of
Baqt, and so on, the 90 identified species from ancient Egypt are all detailed as
beneficiaries, somehow, of a culture that celebrated bird life, and certainly figured
most prominently in the translations of Wallis Budge, the Sacred Ibis, the Shoebill,
Cormorants, Egrets, Red-footed Falcon, Geese, and the Chanting Goshawk
among them.
But not unlike the famed image/inscription of the “Hero Pursuing Two Ostriches”
ca. twelfth/eleventh century B.C. and the “Winged Lion Griffin Attacked by Hero,”
both from the Middle Assyrian period of Mesopotamia, among the Morgan Library
in New York’s most provocative seals, so too in ancient Egypt the alleged love of
birds was a cul-de-sac, a politically promulgated delusion representing an entire
social scheme by which the upper class were buried with quite literally millions of
mummified birds. Thus, for example, the nightjar in Arabic is known as Teyr-el-mat,
“corpse fowl.”
23
This hideous contradiction was perpetuated under the confused sovereignty of
the rulers of Tenochtitlan (current Mexico City) throughout the sixteenth century,
where one of the most oppressive of all zoos was created for the perverse enjoyment
of the Aztec rulers, the last of whom was Motechuzoma II Xocoyotzin (also known
as Montezuma, “Angry Like a Lord”). Many of the hundreds of animals were fed
some 500 turkeys slaughtered each day, as well as “portions of the carcasses of
21 Jackson, H.; Jones, C. G.; Agapow, P. M.; Tatayah, V.; Groombridge, J. J. (2015). “Microevolutionary diversification among Indian Ocean parrots: temporal and spatial changes in phylogenetic diversity as a consequence of extinction and invasion”. Ibid. 157 (3): 496–510. doi: https://
doi.org/10.1111/ibi.12275
22 Hugh Rees LTD, London, 1930.
23 ibid., Vol. 1, p. 62.
29.3 In Memoriam of the Birds
either thought to have vanished or are down to as few as ten individuals, as in the
case of the Mauritius (Echo) Parakeet, the world’s rarest surviving parrot in
the wild.
21
29.3 In Memoriam of the Birds
In 1930 Colonel R. Meinertzhagen, working under the authority of the Egyptian
Government, published his two-volume Nicoll’s Birds of Egypt,
22
the first survey of
its kind since poet Percy Bysshe Shelley’s distant relative, George Shelley, published his own A Handbook to the Birds of Egypt in 1872. Devoting a considerable
section to “The Birds Of Ancient Egypt” (written by R. E. Moreau) and representing
images of birds carved into a tomb at Saqqara, a mural of the Griffon Vulture from
Thebes, a pelican drawing from the Tomb of Mera, of a mallard from the Tomb of
Tehuti Hetep, a swan from the Tomb of Ptahhotep, a night heron from the Tomb of
Baqt, and so on, the 90 identified species from ancient Egypt are all detailed as
beneficiaries, somehow, of a culture that celebrated bird life, and certainly figured
most prominently in the translations of Wallis Budge, the Sacred Ibis, the Shoebill,
Cormorants, Egrets, Red-footed Falcon, Geese, and the Chanting Goshawk
among them.
But not unlike the famed image/inscription of the “Hero Pursuing Two Ostriches”
ca. twelfth/eleventh century B.C. and the “Winged Lion Griffin Attacked by Hero,”
both from the Middle Assyrian period of Mesopotamia, among the Morgan Library
in New York’s most provocative seals, so too in ancient Egypt the alleged love of
birds was a cul-de-sac, a politically promulgated delusion representing an entire
social scheme by which the upper class were buried with quite literally millions of
mummified birds. Thus, for example, the nightjar in Arabic is known as Teyr-el-mat,
“corpse fowl.”
23
This hideous contradiction was perpetuated under the confused sovereignty of
the rulers of Tenochtitlan (current Mexico City) throughout the sixteenth century,
where one of the most oppressive of all zoos was created for the perverse enjoyment
of the Aztec rulers, the last of whom was Motechuzoma II Xocoyotzin (also known
as Montezuma, “Angry Like a Lord”). Many of the hundreds of animals were fed
some 500 turkeys slaughtered each day, as well as “portions of the carcasses of
21 Jackson, H.; Jones, C. G.; Agapow, P. M.; Tatayah, V.; Groombridge, J. J. (2015). “Microevolutionary diversification among Indian Ocean parrots: temporal and spatial changes in phylogenetic diversity as a consequence of extinction and invasion”. Ibid. 157 (3): 496–510. doi: https://
doi.org/10.1111/ibi.12275
22 Hugh Rees LTD, London, 1930.
23 ibid., Vol. 1, p. 62.
29.3 In Memoriam of the Birds