The Crow and Symbolism

Saw this guy the other day. He sat for a long time just letting me take his picture from several different angles. I'm thinking he might have an eye toward the picnickers behind me. There were a number of them in the park the other day. I think I like this picture best. I really do love my digital camera.

Not too lean a fellow. Looks like he lives a pretty good life, at least this time of year with lots of people out enjoying the good weather.

Looked up some stuff about the crow. Have a little guide book for birds in this part of the world.

Northwestern Crow. Resembles the American Crow, except smaller and more slender. Not sure this guy fits that description. A mobbing sort of behavior. Likes to harass the American Crow. Likes shorelines, tidewater areas, edges of coastal forest. This one was staying pretty close to the water in the local park.

Liked the movie, The Crow, too. Love dark stuff like that, liked the sort of Romeo and Juliet, star-crossed lovers angle, and the revenge, of course.


The Crow animal totem. Information about the crow, associated with the raven. Can be found here. An omen of change, be willing to walk your talk. Symbols of creation and spiritual strength. Keeper of the sacred law.

I pulled down one of my books on symbols, An Illustrated Encyclopedia of Traditional Symbols by J.C. Cooper, and alchemically, nigredo refers to the first age of matter in the Great Work. The Egyptian pairs crows to denote conjugal felicity. In Greek, the crow is sacred to Apollo and Athene. In Shintoism, holy crows, messengers of deities, are associated with temples.

Messengers, change, spirituality. If I say it, I've got to mean it. Creation. What was this crow trying to tell me? Must think about it in the context of my life.

Something to consider.

The Untaught vs. Taught Mind - Are we so very jaded?

In reading "The Book of Were-Wolves: Being an Account of a Terrible Superstition" by Sabine Baring-Gould, I like the following passage. Sort of makes one realize how civilized we have become or maybe jaded is the better term. But in order to understand the possible foundation of the paranormal, this makes sense on how a primitive species might "create" monsters in the night that carry forward and alter in verbal storytelling.

"...yet we do not suppose that the wind has a voice. The wild primaeval men thought that it had, and because dogs and wolves howl, and the wind howled, and because they had seen dogs and wolves, they concluded that the storm-wind was a night-hound, or a monstrous wolf, racing over the country in the darkness of the winter night, ravening for prey."

The author refers to the "untaught mind." He goes into depth on the possibilities of how certain tales came about -- swans into swan maidens, wolves into werewolves, lightning as a forked, heavenly fiery serpent.

In essence we know too much to really appreciate, perhaps understand, the imagination explanations given to us in fairy tales and folk lore. And we read with an educated mind as in the revelation of "atmospheric mysteries." We have an understanding of outer space far beyond the primitive. We don't need to make up stories to explain "what's out there." But, especially in fiction, where's the fun in that?

Build a tale with the untaught might, bend it, shape it, explore it, twist it, make it come alive in a new and different fashion. But first explore it with the mind of primitive innocence.

Photo: Courtesy of Flickr.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/123rik/ / CC BY 2.0