THE COCKEREL AND THE POPE

Posted: 02.08.22 in Articles category

Funny how you come across an unusual tale and wonder where it came from. You set out to identify the source and have some obvious leads to follow, but all of them end abruptly as you explore each in turn and ‘hit a brick wall’. What a pity that you cannot trace it. In my book ‘Look at the Birds of the Air’ I wrote the following sentence on page 74: "The sixth-century pope Gregory I claimed the rooster to be a suitable symbol of Christianity because of its association with St Peter". I did not cite a source for this historical information, but I felt confident about including it as I had come across it repeatedly during my research. I did not delve further at the time as the story was only a tangential snippet to a section of my book about chickens in folklore around the world. Yet I was intrigued. It seemed so remarkable that the most powerful church leader of his day would publicly identify the Christian faith with an incident of abject failure - a man betraying his closest friend. I wanted to know more, find out precisely what had been claimed and set it in context. Back to re-reading those earlier texts and it seemed they all pointed to a single source - an encyclopaedia on religions around the world edited by John Furlong and published in 1906. Eventually, I was able to locate the original book on-line via the British Library website. I printed off the relevant pages and eagerly anticipated the moment that I would learn at last about the pope and why he made his extraordinary claim. However, that moment when it came was a personal anti-climax. The entry about cockerels simply devotes a single sentence to Pope Gregory as follows:

It [the cockerel] is a natural emblem of the dawn and rising sun; but Pope Gregory I (about 600 A.C.) said "it was the most suitable emblem of Christianity", being "the emblem of St Peter".

What I found especially frustrating was the apparent knowledge the unknown author had of a source for Pope Gregory's claim. The writer of the entry presented the papal assertion in speech marks, implying s/he was quoting Pope Gregory verbatim without identifying when and where the pope had said or written those words. I seemed no further forward. I clearly needed to broaden my research and turned my attention to selected biographies of Pope Gregory, and where possible to translated texts of his writings. There is no shortage of such material, especially of his own prolific writings.

Pope Gregory the First (also known as St Gregory the Great) was bishop of Rome from September 590 until March 604 when he died. He lived during a turbulent period when the city had become a shrunken shadow of its great imperial past, ravaged repeatedly during the sixth century by various invading forces and its population decimated by plague and famine. For a brief time, Gregory was the city prefect, but he gave up public service to become a contemplative monk. It seems he became pope with extreme reluctance, yet he proved one of the most accomplished in his deeds and most voluminous in his writings. His many achievements included an effective relief programme for Rome’s poor and the re-introduction of Roman Christianity to England through his envoy’s mission to Kent. Gregory advanced the cult of St Peter, using the apostle’s tomb as its locus. His repeated assertions of Petrine authority had the effect of advancing the status and pre-eminence of Rome and the papacy within Christendom. Yet Gregory’s focus on St Peter often acknowledged the apostle’s weaknesses. His writings highlighted Peter as a role model to encourage humility and repentance precisely because of those failings, for instance seen through Peter’s altercation with Paul over circumcision and especially his thrice-fold denial of Jesus shortly before the crucifixion.

Despite extensive searching, I have still not located the source of that quotation cited in 1906. I have read much of Gregory’s writings which bear out his devotion to St Peter and have also read his various comments on cockerels. However, none of the latter claim the cockerel to be a suitable emblem of Christianity. Instead, these refer to the birds crowing at night as analogous examples for preachers to emulate. Yet although I have not found the quotation that was object of my original search, I still think it plausible Gregory made such an assertion in, say, one of his many letters. He was unusually willing to draw attention to the failings of saints like Peter as salutary examples. Was he seeking to demonstrate a Christian paradox that victory comes through defeat? With the supreme example of the Cross in mind, did Gregory recognise the suitability of the cockerel as a symbol of triumph borne through failure?