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Day 2 of 12 Days of Christmas: Two Turtledoves

The winter is past, the rain is over and gone. The flowers appear on the earth; the time of singing has come, and the voice of the turtle-dove is heard in our land. — Song of Solomon

Time will work what no man knoweth
Time doth us the subject prove
With time still affection groweth
To the faithful turtledove.
— Sir Philip Sidney

SONGS about TURTLE DOVES:

SONGS about 12 DAYS of CHRISTMAS (comic):

Signs of My Love’s Return — Chris Obiora 

Let two grey turtledoves,
Clapping against the clouds,
On their backs the sun,
Be a symbol of our love.

Let a crumbling moon
In a blue sodden sky
Be a keepsake of sadness
Felt with your goodbye.

And the faithful geese from
Europe’s cold winter turn
Homeward bound to Africa
So will my love soon return.

Turtle doves in culture (full article: https://operationturtledove.org/turtle-doves/turtle-doves-in-culture/)

Turtle doves have featured in art and culture for thousands of years. Their beauty, song and behaviour inspired Ancient Greeks and Romans, Elizabethan poets, modern musicians, and painters. Perhaps because of their endearing, soothing purr and tender affections when seen perched in pairs, they have long been symbols of love…… Turtle doves and weddings are a perfect match: these birds have often had romantic associations, and in poetry they’re usually connected with fidelity and trust.

Roman deity Fides was often pictured holding a turtle dove: she was the goddess of good faith (as in the Latin term bona fide). In Greek mythology, the birds pulled the chariot of Aphrodite, the goddess of love.

Chaucer, in his Parlement of Foules, mentioned “The wedded turtledove with her heart true”…. Turtle doves weren’t just thought of as devoted, monogamous partners. If one of a pair died, the other was believed to mourn, and perhaps never bond with another bird again. Co-ruler of Florence, Giuliano de’ Medici was murdered in 1478, aged 25. A posthumous portrait of him by Botticelli includes a perched turtle dove. It’s said that Medici’s partner commissioned the picture, with the bird representing her, in mourning.

William Shakespeare frequently wrote about turtle doves (sometimes calling them “turtles”), sometimes to symbolise love and devotion:

  • King Henry VI: “a pair of loving turtle-doves that could not live asunder day or night”
  • The Merry Wives of Windsor: “we’ll teach him to know turtles from jays”
  • The Taming of the Shrew: “O slow-winged turtle, shall a buzzard take thee”
  • Troilus and Cressida: “As sun to day, as turtle to her mate”
  • The Winter’s Tale: “So turtles pair, that never mean to part” and “I, an old turtle, Will wing me to some withered bough and there, My mate, that’s never to be found again, Lament till I am lost.”
  • Spring and Winter (a poem): “When turtles tread, and rooks, and daws, And maidens bleach their summer smocks”
    Shakespeare also wrote “The Phoenix and the Turtle”, a poem which was published in 1601. It’s about the funeral of the phoenix and the turtle dove, who were lovers. The poem has been interpreted as an allegory about the death of ideal love, referencing people of Shakespeare’s time including Elizabeth I, or a cryptic eulogy to Catholic martyrs.

Other writers inspired by turtle doves include Anne Bronte, Carol Ann Duffy and Edgar Allen Poe.

Turtle doves are still a symbol of affection today. Cockney rhyming slang also adopted “turtle dove” to mean love (and also “glove”). And in a touching scene in Home Alone 2, released in 1992, Kevin presents one of his turtle dove ornaments to the Bird Lady, saying that as they have one each, they’ll be friends forever…

The Phoenix and the Turtle

—William Shakespeare
 

Let the bird of loudest lay

On the sole Arabian tree

Herald sad and trumpet be,

To whose sound chaste wings obey.

But thou shrieking harbinger,

Foul precurrer of the fiend,

Augur of the fever’s end,

To this troop come thou not near.

From this session interdict

Every fowl of tyrant wing,

Save the eagle, feather’d king;

Keep the obsequy so strict.

Let the priest in surplice white,

That defunctive music can,

Be the death-divining swan,

Lest the requiem lack his right.

And thou treble-dated crow,

That thy sable gender mak’st

With the breath thou giv’st and tak’st,

‘Mongst our mourners shalt thou go.

Here the anthem doth commence:

Love and constancy is dead;

Phoenix and the Turtle fled

In a mutual flame from hence.

So they lov’d, as love in twain

Had the essence but in one;

Two distincts, division none:

Number there in love was slain.

Hearts remote, yet not asunder;

Distance and no space was seen

‘Twixt this Turtle and his queen:

But in them it were a wonder.

So between them love did shine

That the Turtle saw his right

Flaming in the Phoenix’ sight:

Either was the other’s mine.

Property was thus appalled

That the self was not the same;

Single nature’s double name

Neither two nor one was called.

Reason, in itself confounded,

Saw division grow together,

To themselves yet either neither,

Simple were so well compounded;

That it cried, “How true a twain

Seemeth this concordant one!

Love has reason, reason none,

If what parts can so remain.”

Whereupon it made this threne

To the Phoenix and the Dove,

Co-supremes and stars of love,

As chorus to their tragic scene:

                 threnos

Beauty, truth, and rarity,

Grace in all simplicity,

Here enclos’d, in cinders lie.

Death is now the Phoenix’ nest,

And the Turtle’s loyal breast

To eternity doth rest,

Leaving no posterity:

‘Twas not their infirmity,

It was married chastity.

Truth may seem but cannot be;

Beauty brag but ’tis not she;

Truth and beauty buried be.

To this urn let those repair

That are either true or fair;

For these dead birds sigh a prayer.

The Turtle Dove — James Casey

O can’t you see yon little turtle dove
Sitting under the China Berry tree?
See how that she does mourn for her true love:
And I will mourn for thee

O God speed, my little turtle dove,
And fare thee well for a-while;
But though I go I’ll surely come again,
If I go ten thousand mile,

Ten thousand mile is very far away,
For you to return to me,
You leave me here to carry on,
My tears you will not see.

The crow that’s black, my little turtle dove,
Shall change its color white;
Before I’m false to the woman I love,
The noon-day shall be night.

The hills shall fly, my little turtle dove,
The sun will fade away
Before my heart shall suffer me to fail,
Cause I will return by Friday

Day 2 of 12 Days of Christmas: Two Turtledoves
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