Caladrius

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Caladrius. Bibliothèque Nationale de France , Latin 14429, Folio 106v; 13th century

The Caladrius , also Charadrius , Galadrius and similar, is a large, mostly white bird of mythology and superstition that influences the course of human diseases. In the Middle Ages it appeared in the bestiaries and in the editions of the Physiologus and is part of Christian iconography .

Fictional properties

The Caladrius lives in ruling houses and predicts the course of an illness. If he looks a sick person in the face, it means that they will get well and go on living. If the bird looks away, the sick person will die of his suffering.

The Caladrius can heal by withdrawing the disease from man, absorbing it into himself and thus flying away into the sun, which burns the disease and thus destroys it.

history

Caladrius at a king's sickbed. British Library , Harley 4751 f. 40; 13th century

In antiquity and in the early Indo-European region, superstition attributed healing powers to the golden plover , Charadrius pluvialis , and its golden-yellow spotted plumage. As an “unclean” bird it was inedible, the excrement was used as medicine. In contrast to the ancient writings, the late ancient Physiologus describes Caladrius as a pure white bird and gives him the fable of the prophesying and all diseases, swan-like creature, which is primarily dedicated to the rulers. The Christian Middle Ages saw in its spotless white the symbol for Jesus Christ , who turned away from the Jews and turned to the Gentiles in order to take away their sin, their "illness".

Lore

The tradition of the name, like that of the story, has numerous variants, which are essentially based on misunderstandings and reading errors.

The name of the wondrous bird, charadrius , also appears in Middle Latin in the form caladris , created by dissimilation , which led to identification with calandris , the lark . In the Vulgate , the Hebrew anaphah (impure bird) is translated as charadrios and thus brings the sandpiper into play, which Luther transferred as a heron and thus added another bird variant. In addition, similar name versions are documented.

The ancient world attributed the healing of jaundice to the sight of plover plumage . His excrement was expected to be effective against blindness . A related passage in the Physiologus ( […] cuius interior fimus oculorum caliginem curet […] ) led to the confusion of fimus (manure) and femur (thigh), which resulted in the 13th century version that you can use the bone marrow from the Caladrius's thighs could heal the blind. In another variant, the Galadrius carries a stone in his leg, which - placed on the eye - leads to better eyesight and thus makes it possible to consecrate the stingy rich to death by looking away and to help the benevolent to sustain happiness by looking at them.

literature

Web links

Commons : Medieval Caladrius Representations  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Information on the manuscript
  2. ^ Zoltán Kádár : Charadrius . In: Lexicon of Christian Iconography 1968; Edition 2004, Vol. 1, Col. 354.
  3. ^ Source of the British Library
  4. ↑ Liselotte Stauch: Charadrius , in: Reallexikon zur Deutschen Kunstgeschichte (RDK) III, Sp. 417–424 (1952) online at RDKLabor
  5. ↑ Christa Baufeld: Small Early New High German Dictionary: Lexicon from poetry and specialist literature of Early New High German . Walter de Gruyter, January 1, 1996, ISBN 978-3-11-096783-8 , p. 100.
  6. ↑ Lev. XI, 19 and Deut. XIV, 18
  7. ↑ According to Liselotte Stauch (1952): karadrius, kaladrius, kaladrus, galadrius, golodrius; as well as in confusion with the lark: calandrius, kalander, galander, galiander and golander.
  8. ↑ Max Wellmann : Charadrios. In: Paulys Realencyclopadie der classischen Antiquity Science (RE). Volume III, 2, Stuttgart 1899, Col. 2115 ( digitized version ).
  9. ↑ Eng .: his <from within> dung heals the darkness of the eyes
  10. ↑ Liselotte Stauch: Charadrius , in: Reallexikon zur Deutschen Kunstgeschichte (RDK) III, Sp. 417–424 (1952) online at RDKLabor