Raven, Rochester Bestiary, c.1230

The medieval bestiary suggests the raven does not feed its young well until it recognises that they look like themselves, and when their feathers turn black they see them as their young and then they will feed them in large quantities. They are sometimes seen as sinful or unfaithful (Barber 2008).

Transcription

Translation

Corvus est predicator gentilis. qui niger fuit
in pccatis. sed in adventu christi; cantate predicando; in
fenestra sensuum nostrorum. et in superliminari; videlicet
menti nostre sapientie verba infigens. Vel in ma-
lam partem totum legi potest. Per hec enim animalia
que omnia inmunda sunt; significantur vicia vel de-
monia que habitant in anima per ypocrisis similitudi-
nem; spinosa vel speciosam. et mentis rationem. et sensus nostros se-
ducunt. Limen enim; corpus vel sensualitas est. Super
liminare autem anima vel ratio. que omnia seduc-
tione demonum viciantur.

The raven is a Gentile preacher, who was black in the penances, but in the advent of Christ; sing while preaching; in the window of our senses, and on the threshold; that is, impressing words of wisdom upon our minds. Or the whole can be read in a bad way. For by this all animals are unclean; vices or demons are signified which dwell in the soul through the likeness of hypocrisy; thorny or beautiful, and the reasoning of our mind and our senses. For the threshold; it is the body or sensuality. But above the threshold, the soul or the reason, that everything is defeated by the seduction of demons.