Pennatarum rursus aliae pedibus sunt nudis, aliae hirsutis, [194] quas posteriores Germani {Gehossle}[1] <Gehössle? gehösslete> {hennen} <Hennen> dicunt, quasi caligis indutas. Rursum aliae cristam habent simplicem, aliae duplicem, caudam aliae, et aliae minime.

In turn, among those furnished with feathers, some have naked legs, others have legs bristled with feathers, and Germans call these latest gehösslete Hennen - shod hens, as if shod with footwear. Furthermore some have a single comb, others a duplex one, some have a tail and others not at all.

In partu praeterea maximum discrimen est. Iuvencae enim, ut Plinius[2], et Aristoteles[3] scribunt primae pariunt statim vere ineunte, et plura quam veteres, at minora: et in eodem foetu prima, et novissima (scilicet minora pariunt) ut Plinius ex semetipso addidit. Contra vero Albertus Gallinas iuvenes aestate parere, veteres principio veris asserit, et hanc rationem addit, quod aestate superfluus humor, uti, et autumno in iuvenibus excitetur, veterum vero frigiditas caliditate, et humiditate verni temporis temperetur; quae sane ratio omnino philosophica est, et veritati consona.

Moreover, as far as eggs laying is concerned, the difference is very wide. For, as Pliny and Aristotle write, young hens are first in laying eggs as soon as the spring begins and more than older ones, but smaller eggs: and, in the span of a same producing career, they are thus - so made, i.e. smaller - the first and the last ones (that is, they lay them smaller) as Pliny himself added. On the contrary Albertus claims that young hens lay in the summer, the older ones at the beginning of spring, and is adding this reason: that in young hens in summer as well as in autumn their fluid in excess is excited, while the sluggishness of old hens is mitigated by heat and humidity of springtime; really this explanation is completely philosophic, and corresponding to the truth.

Rursus alias bis in die, alias semel tantum ova edere cum ipsum Aristotelem[4], tum Plinium authores habemus. Nonnullae etiam e cortalibus, inquit ille, bis pariunt. Iam aliquae in tantum copiae provenerunt, ut {effatae} <effetae> brevi morerentur. Quam sententiam indubitanter hunc in modum Plinius[5] ab illo transtulit: Est autem, inquit, tanta foecunditas ut aliquae, et sexagena pariant, {aliquo} <aliquae> quotidie, aliquae bis, aliquae in tantum, ut {effatae} <effetae> moriantur. Aristoteles[6] etiam alibi, si modo genuinus Aristoteles, author est ex aliorum relatione Gallinas in Illyria, non uti alibi semel parere, sed bis, aut ter in die. Item alibi[7] disertissimis verbis tradit, in genere Gallinarum esse, quae pariant ova omnia gemina: in quibus animadversum sit, quod de vitello exposuit, (dixerat autem ova gemina binis constare vitellis, qui ne invicem confundantur, facere in nonnullis quoddam praetenue septum albuminis medium: aliis vero, vitellos contactu mutuo sine ullo discrimine coniungi). Ait autem {quasdam} <quandam> duodeviginti peperisse gemina, eaque exclusisse, praeterquam si quae essent, ut fit, irrita{:}<.> Caeteris foetus prodiisse, sed ita geminos exclusos, ut alter esset maior: alter minor: et tandem in monstrum degenerasse, qui minor novissime provenisset.

Again we have not only Aristotle himself but also Pliny as sources regarding the fact that some lay eggs twice a day, others only once. The former says: Among barnyard hens some lay also twice. Some reached also a so big amount that they died exhausted in a short time. Doubtless Pliny quoted from him these words in the following way: Moreover their fecundity is so big, he says, that some come to lay also sixty eggs, some once a day, others twice, others lay so much that they die exhausted. Also elsewhere Aristotle, on condition that he is the true Aristotle, reports from someone else’s tale that in Illyria the hens do not lay once a day as they do elsewhere, but twice or thrice a day. Likewise in another passage with very clear words he says that within the genus of the hens there are those which lay all twin eggs: but in this regard we must pay attention to what he told about the yolk (for he had said that twin eggs are made up by two yolks, which, in order to do not merge each other, in some eggs give rise to like a very thin diaphragm of albumen in between: while in other eggs the yolks are joined by mutual contact without any separation). He says moreover that a hen had laid eighteen twin eggs, and that she hatched them, except those which, as it happens, were germ-free: From the other eggs hatched chicks, but the hence hatched twins were of that sort that one was larger: the other smaller: and finally the smaller one, last hatched, degenerated into freak.

Verum eiusmodi partus praeter potius quam secundum naturam fieri videri possit. Nam et Plinius[8] etiam tradit Cornelii Celsi authoritate nixus Gallinas quasdam omnia gemina parere, et geminos interdum excludere, atque alterum pullorum maiorem esse, alioquin {negare} <negant> omnino geminos excludi. Vetus item quidam Aristotelis interpres, ut ex recentiori quodam citat Ornithologus, ad eundem sensum vertit ex Arabico hoc pacto: Et in quolibet inveniuntur gemelli, et unus gemellorum parvus est, et alter magnus: et multoties est parvus monstrosus. Sed Graeca Aristotelis exemplaria, nisi mendum subesse iudicemus, ita habent[9]. Τὰ μὲν οὖν ἄλλα γόνιμα, πλήν ὅσα τὸ μὲν μεῖζον τὸ δὲ ἔλαττον γίνεται τῶν διδύμων, τὸ δὲ τελευταῖον τερατώδες: hoc est, ut ego arbitror: caeteris itaque gemina faecunda sunt, nisi quibus hoc contingit, ut alter maior fuerit, alter minor. Ex iis enim tandem in monstrum degenerat, qui minor {nonissime} <novissime> provenit.[10] Quibus verbis aperte habemus, eiusmodi geminorum ovorum partum minime ex Aristotelis sententia monstruosum esse, sed ex minoribus, qui novissime generatur in monstrum tantummodo abire. Et videtur certe Plinius vel ex professo cum Aristotele, quem alioqui alias ubique sequi solet, hac in re minime convenire, quando Cornelium Celsum authorem, non Aristotelem citet. Utra autem sententia fuerit verior monstrabit experientia. Mihi quidem Aristoteli adhaerere multorum fide dignorum relationes, et experientia ipsa cogunt, atque eo magis, cum in quibusdam Plinianis exemplaribus habeatur, uti recte annotavit Claymundus, non alioqui, sed aliqui negant omnino geminos excludi. Ornithologus quaerit, an legendum in Aristotelis verbis non πλήν ὅσα, sed πλήν ὅτι: et γίνεται praesens loco praeteriti ἐγένετο accipiendum sit, ut non simpliciter hic de ovis geminis scribat Aristoteles, sed de illius tantum Gallinae geminis, quorum historiam hoc in loco recitat hoc sensu: Ex ovis octodecim Gallinae cuiusdam omnibus geminis, pauca quaedam irrita fuerunt: caetera vero omnia rite foecunda: nisi quod e geminis pullus alter semper minor fuit, et ultimus (alter scilicet minor de ovo postremo excluso vel parto) monstruosus.

Really it could seem that a hatching of this kind is occurring more against rather then in accordance with Nature. For also Pliny records on the authority of Cornelius Celsus that Some hens lay all twin eggs, and sometimes they hatch out twins, and one of the two chicks is larger, on the other hand they are claiming that twins are no hatching out at all. Also an ancient translator of Aristotle, as the Ornithologist cites from a more recent one, translates with the same meaning from Arabic as follows: And in whatever egg twins are found, one of the twins is small, the other is large: and often the small one is freakish. But the Greek manuscripts of Aristotle, unless we believe that there a mistake is concealed, have this passage: Tà mèn oûn álla gónima, plën hósa tò mèn meîzon tò dè élatton ghìnetai tøn didýmøn, tò dè teleutaîon teratødes: that is, as I think: Therefore, in comparison with the other ones, the twin eggs are fertile, but to some of them it happens that a twin is larger, the other smaller. In short, of them degenerates then into a freak the smaller one, hatched out as last. From these words we clearly learn that according to the statement of Aristotle the hatching of such twin eggs is not freakish at all, but that only that which is hatching out as last from smaller ones turns into a freak. And doubtless it turns out clear that Pliny openly in this regard doesn’t agree with Aristotle, whom otherwise elsewhere he usually entirely follows, being that he quotes as reliable source Cornelius Celsus, not Aristotle. Then experience will show which one of two statements is closer to the truth. But, as for me, they are compelling me to adhere to Aristotle the reports of many trustworthy authors and the experience itself, all the more because in some Pliny’s manuscripts is quoted, as Claymundus correctly pointed out, not alioqui - on the other hand, but aliqui - some people - negant omnino geminos excludi - affirm that twins are not hatched at all. The Ornithologist wonders whether in the words of Aristotle we must read not plën hósa - except as much as, but plën hóti - except that: and whether the present tense ghínetai – hatches - should be read in place of the past tense eghéneto - hatched, since in this passage Aristotle is not merely writing about twin eggs, but only of the twin eggs of that hen, whose eggs in the following excerpt he is quoting the history as follows: Of the eighteen all twin eggs of a hen, only few of them were sterile: doubtless all the others were fertile as usual: except that, from the twin ones, one of two chicks hatched out always smaller, and the last one (that is, the smaller of the couple, hatched out from the last hatched or laid egg) was freakish.

Ut ut est, eiusmodi partum minime monstruosum esse concludendum est: nam et Pierius Valerianus[11] apud Macedones Gallinam repertam asserit ex aliorum relatu, quae ova duodeviginti semel ediderit, et incubitu binos pullos ex ovis singulis excluserit. Quod vero gemina quaedam singulis diebus edant id Patavii sese observasse testatur tertio etiam nonnunquam addito, verum eo abortivo, Excellentissimus M. Antonius Ulmus, cuius paulo ante mentionem feci, exper<i>entia monitus Pierium vera narrasse asseverat, sed quam ipse gemina peperisse vidit, eam id bis in hebdomada tantum praestitisse aiebat, idque horis matutinis, et vespertinis, Gallinamque tandem ob uteri decidentiam obiisse, fuisse autem Gallinam Patavinam. Vere itaque monstrificos pullos dicemus, qui gemini ex uno ovo proveniunt simul coniuncti. Fit enim saepe, ut pullus sit bicorporeus, unde apud Albertum legimus{.}<:> In ovis quibusdam gemelli sunt, sed alter gemellorum comprimit alium, et aliquando ruptis telis (tunicis) bicorporeus generatur.

Be that as it may, we must conclude that a laying of this kind is not abnormal at all: for also Giovan Pietro Bolzani asserts on the basis of description by others that among the Macedonians a hen was found which only once laid eighteen eggs, and after she incubated them delivered two chicks from each egg. The most excellent Marco Antonio Olmo, whom I mentioned a short while ago, bears witness that he himself had seen in Padua that truly some hens lay daily two eggs, sometimes also adding a third one, which however is abortive - without yolk, and on his own experience is assuring that Bolzani told the truth, but that the same hen he himself saw laying two eggs, he was claiming that she did so only twice in a week, and precisely in the morning and evening hours, and that finally the hen died because of a prolapsed uterus - oviduct?, moreover she was a Paduan hen. Thus we should properly call as monstrous chicks those which being twins come out from a single egg joined together. For it often happens that a chick has two bodies, hence we read in Albertus: In some eggs there are twins, but one of twins compresses the other, and sometimes after the membranes (the coverings) are ruptured he hatches endowed with two bodies.