Preface

Owl studies have often taken me to the best bat biotopes as well, and quite some time ago I started to collect data on bats and owls in global folklore. Bats and owls are both iconic nocturnal creatures that are surrounded by a myriad of strange old wives' tales and superstitions worldwide. This volume is a collection of global perceptions aiming to promote a better biocultural richness for humans, bats, and owls as our long-term nocturnal companions.

In ancient Azania in north and central Africa bats were universally disliked and considered very unlucky if found hooting around a homestead during the night [1]. Also, in central Africa should a bat or an owl come near the house, or a bush cat defecate in the compound, the owner must go at once to a diviner to discover what remedies must be taken to ward off the evil. A witch shape is believed to be capable of sucking the life out of a sleeping man or woman [2]. In Nilotic Sudan, witchcraft was usually performed at night and therefore owls and bats were associated with it [3].

In southeastern Australia, tribal life was much bound up with animals, but men were especially represented by bats and women by owls. The Wotjobaluk tribe held the firm belief that the lives of its women were influenced by the owl Yàrtatgurk, and those of men by the bat: "the common bat belongs to the men who protect it against injury, even to half-killing their wives for its sake" [4].

The fern owl belongs to the women and although the bird of evil omen, creates terror at night by its cry, it is jealously protected by them. "If a man kills one owl even by mistake, they are enraged as if it was one of their children and women will strike him with their yam sticks." The jealous protection thus afforded by Australian men and women to bats and owls respectively is not based purely on selfish considerations. Each woman believes that the lives of her mother, sister, daughter, and so forth, equally her own, are bound up with the lives of particular owls and that in guarding the owl species, she is guarding the lives of her female relations. Females say that "if my sister Mary's life is in an owl, the owl is my sister and Mary is an owl." Respectively, males said, "if my brother John's life is in a bat, then, on the other hand, the bat is my brother as well as John." Since no one knew exactly which bat or owl guarded a particular soul, all bats and owls were effectively protected [4].

In parts of the Indian sub-continent people believed that Bat was married to Owl [5].

In eastern Indonesia, Nage people believe that all witch birds like owls and even diurnal raptors are flesh eaters, either hunters or scavengers, while bats are not carnivorous. They also describe insect-eating small bats as fruit-consuming animals. The Nage do not taboo the consumption of bat flesh like they do with flesh of all witch birds. They categorize bats as "birds," although they don't consider them as good examples of birds. Bats are not identified with any category of spiritual beings, nor are they prominent in myth. More importantly, bats are not included in the symbolic

class of witch birds. The Nage ascription to witches of nocturnal habits, killing and cannibalistic consumption, eerie vocalizations, flight, and the ability to rotate their heads would appear, in most if not quite all respects, to reflect the empirically observable physical features of owls rather than of human beings [6].

It was striking to learn that in the old European folklore owls and bats were often mixed, causing many strange beliefs [7]. First it was believed that bat is a bird, and to add confusion it was named as strix in the folktales. The strix was regarded as a veritable bird of hell, and Gaius Plinius Secundus (AD 23/24–79) wrote that the strix was potent also in malediction [7].

In Ancient Greek story of Polyphonte who gave birth to two humanoid bear-like sons because of her union with a bear. The bear twins honored neither men nor gods; rather, they were cannibals who attacked strangers on the road. Zeus despised the sons and their mother and asked Hermes to punish them [8]. Mother Polyphonte was transformed into a strix that cries by night, without food or drink, with head below and tips of feet above, a harbinger of war and civil strife to men. Son Oreius became a bird that is seen for no good and the other son Agrius was changed into a vulture, of all birds most detested by gods and men and possessed of a constant craving for human flesh and blood. Antonius cites Boeus's second book, *The Origin of Birds*, as the source of this story from the end of the fourth century BC; however, Boeus' work has been lost [7]. To the ancients in general, the bat is a bird. Therefore, it has been questioned if the strix was a bat and not an owl as so often supposed [8].

The ancient literature of Greece and Rome during the seven centuries from Boio to Serenus Sammonicus (died 212 AD) present a consistent view of the strix. The bird is clearly mythical, but its physical characteristics were those of a bat rather than those of an owl, as so often supposed. The bird is vampiric, but never a true vampire. Titinius (lived around 170 BC) makes it clear that strix is plainly chiropterous. Domenico Comparetti (1835-1927) also wrote in his 'Novelline Populari Italiene' that the souls of the three beautiful sisters were three pipistrelle bats [7].

Later when Striges became the ornithological appellation of the entire suborder of the owls, the confusion was even deeper. Públius Ovidius Nāsō (43 BC-17/18 AD) mentions eggs of the strix and Quintus Horatius Flaccus (65 BC – 8 BC) and Sextus Propertius (50-45 BC – ca. 15 BC) mention its feathers. Literally, eggs and feathers exclude the mammalian, chiropteran strix of Titinius, but it was natural to ascribe them to any bird, real or imaginary. Irish folk-lore still believes in the eggs of bats and their potency in malignant charms. Pomponius Porphyrio (flourished 2nd century AD) sees strix as a vague and undefined "nocturnal bird of evil omen" but there is no compelling evidence for the screech owl [7].

In Medieval Icelandic and Viking Age Norse mythology the bat is the messenger of Hel, the goddess of darkness and death, and is feared as such [7, 9]. The owl relations of Vikings is not so well documented, but it is said that the Vikings and their ancestors looked at animals with awe and administration [10]. Huathe, the hawthorn, is a mystic rune associated with the owl. In the Viking world, the owl is the guide to the underworld. It helps people to see the spiritual and actual dark and it shows how to look inside the darkness in ourselves and find a way out of it [11].

**V**

to end [13].

The earliest inhabitants of Jamaica, the Taino people, believed that mankind originated from caves. The bat and the owl were very important symbols in Taino mythology and death. The bat represented the opias because fruit-eating bats like Jamaican fruit-eating bat *Artibeus jamaicensis* love eating guavas. Guava is also the favorite food of the Taino spirits of the dead, explaining why bats are perceived as death images in the folklore [12]. Amongst Jamaican folk tradition, the owl also symbolizes death. The owl is considered the divine bird of the coyaba, heaven or underworld. Taino people were terrified of the owl's nocturnal call because they believed the bird was the herald of the lord of coyaba and it was delivering the message that a human life was about

In South America, bats and owls have had agricultural as well as death associations for pre-Colombian people. In a Mochica vessel, a bat is posed as if it were presenting food. Mochica squash depictions may also have an owl head, another indication of the interaction of bat and owl, for vegetables seem to have distinct associations – a fanged

The north coast of Peru is one of the regions where bat iconography is particularly prominent. On Mochica pottery an anthropomorphic bat is an agent of human sacrifice having funeral connotations. An anthropomorphic owl also appears in this role. Bats and owls are nocturnal, and both can be predators. In folklore from the South American

lowlands at both ends of the continent, they are often brothers-in-law [15–20].

On the south coast of Peru there are fewer bats, and they are not presented in Nasca ceramics where the vencejo or the hummingbird may play a similar role [14]. The common potoo (*Nyctibius griseus*) would be an interesting substitution for the bat because it belongs to the order of Caprimulgiformes and greatly resembles an owl.

This book includes seven chapters that discuss owls and their significance in Africa,

My warmest thanks to Author Service Manager Zrinka Tomicic at IntechOpen for her professional and helpful cooperation throughout the publication of this book. I am also grateful to Alan Sieradzki for his everlasting enthusiasm in seeking and finding

**Heimo Mikkola**

Kuopio, Finland

Eastern Finland University,

deity with maize, a diseased face with potatoes, and so on [14].

Bulgaria, Ecuador, Iraq, Slovakia, and Syria.

some little-known bat and owl lore publications.

The earliest inhabitants of Jamaica, the Taino people, believed that mankind originated from caves. The bat and the owl were very important symbols in Taino mythology and death. The bat represented the opias because fruit-eating bats like Jamaican fruit-eating bat *Artibeus jamaicensis* love eating guavas. Guava is also the favorite food of the Taino spirits of the dead, explaining why bats are perceived as death images in the folklore [12]. Amongst Jamaican folk tradition, the owl also symbolizes death. The owl is considered the divine bird of the coyaba, heaven or underworld. Taino people were terrified of the owl's nocturnal call because they believed the bird was the herald of the lord of coyaba and it was delivering the message that a human life was about to end [13].

In South America, bats and owls have had agricultural as well as death associations for pre-Colombian people. In a Mochica vessel, a bat is posed as if it were presenting food. Mochica squash depictions may also have an owl head, another indication of the interaction of bat and owl, for vegetables seem to have distinct associations – a fanged deity with maize, a diseased face with potatoes, and so on [14].

The north coast of Peru is one of the regions where bat iconography is particularly prominent. On Mochica pottery an anthropomorphic bat is an agent of human sacrifice having funeral connotations. An anthropomorphic owl also appears in this role. Bats and owls are nocturnal, and both can be predators. In folklore from the South American lowlands at both ends of the continent, they are often brothers-in-law [15–20].

On the south coast of Peru there are fewer bats, and they are not presented in Nasca ceramics where the vencejo or the hummingbird may play a similar role [14]. The common potoo (*Nyctibius griseus*) would be an interesting substitution for the bat because it belongs to the order of Caprimulgiformes and greatly resembles an owl.

This book includes seven chapters that discuss owls and their significance in Africa, Bulgaria, Ecuador, Iraq, Slovakia, and Syria.

My warmest thanks to Author Service Manager Zrinka Tomicic at IntechOpen for her professional and helpful cooperation throughout the publication of this book. I am also grateful to Alan Sieradzki for his everlasting enthusiasm in seeking and finding some little-known bat and owl lore publications.

> **Heimo Mikkola** Eastern Finland University, Kuopio, Finland
