Bibliotheca Arnamagnæana - 01.06.1991, Síða 131
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Hrabanus Maurus in his Allegoriae in Sacram Scripturam ascribes
two characteristics to the accipiter resultant from the different contexts
in which the bird is to be found in the Bible:
Accipiter quilibet electus, ut injob: ‘Nunquid per sapientiam tuam plumescit
accipiter’... Per accipitrem rapaces, ut in Daniele: ‘Et ungues crescent quasi
accipitris’50.
The secdon on the accipiter in Hugo de Folieto’s Aviarium is more
composite. The various properties of the bird are listed under different
headings51.1 shall just quote the moral of the chapter on the silvester et
domesticus accipiter, since it is the most relevant to what I am trying
to prove:
Moraliter: silvester accipiter captas volucres et rapit et devorat, quia quilibet
perversus actus et cogitationes simplicium dissipare non cessat. Domesticus
vero accipiter est spiritualis pater, qui toties silvestres volucres rapit, quoties
saeculares ad conversionem praedicando trahit52.
We could maintain that we recognise an echo of Hugo’s words
silvester accipiter captas volucres et rapit et devorat in the OIP sentence
En gieda gripr brod snarplega oc slitr. Nevertheless, the coupling rapit et
devorat and the similar one rapiat et...necat can be referred to the
milvus, as we have already seen in regard to Ms. Douce 88 II and as we
deduce from some excerpts of the Aviarium: insidiatur pullis ut eos
rapiat, et quos incautos reperit velocius necat5S. Unless we find an exclu-
sive correspondence, it is difficult to State definitely to which bird the
OIP referred in the second sentence of its short section, since milvus
and accipiter share a predatory nature.
50 PL 112, col. 853. This allegorical interpretation with which accipiter is associated,
both in bonam (accipiter/sanctus) and in malampartem (accipiter/daemones, rapaces) may
be also found in S. Melitonis C lavis (Pitra, Analecta II, p. 87), in Hieronymus Lauretus,
Sylva Allegoriarum, p. 31 and in Aldrovandi, Ornithologiae, pp. 326-28.
51 PL 177, cols. 20-23; ‘De accipitre quomodo plumescat expandens alas suas ad
austrum, De duabus accipitrum speciebus, De domesticorum accipitrum curatione, De
accipitris in laeva gestatione, De pertica, super quam stat aut sedet accipiter, De
accipitrum pedicis seu compedibus, De loro seu corrigia, et ligamine accipitris’.
52 PL 177, cols. 21-22.
53 PL 177, col. 42.