Denique in hoc vulgato proverbio [203] Ὅταν Νίβας κοκκύσῃ[1], hoc est, cum Nibas coc<c>yssaverit[2]: id verbum de Galli voce, non autem de Cuculi dicitur. Tradunt enim in Thessalonica Macedoniae civitate, ut supra[3] etiam annotavimus, vicum esse, cui nomen Nibas, ubi Galli nunquam vocem edant. Hinc merito κοκκοβόας ὄρνις, et ὀρθριοκόκκυξ Gallus Hesychio[4], et Varino dicitur. Haud tamen interim nego Cuculo eam vocem convenire: siquidem suo loco id alias ostendi.

Finally, in this common proverb Hótan Níbas kokkýsëi, that is, when Nibas will have crowed: the verb is referring to the voice of the cock and not of the cuckoo. In fact, as I noted above, they say that in the Macedonian city of Thessalonica there is a village named Nibas where the roosters never crow. Hence deservedly by Hesychius and Varinus the rooster is called kokkobóas órnis - kókky = cuckoo, the voice of the cuckoo + boáø = to bawl - and orthriokókkyx - crowing at dawn. Nevertheless in the meantime I do not deny absolutely that that term fits the cuckoo: in fact indeed I have said this at its proper place.

῎ᾼδειν verbum de Gallinaceorum voce privatim usurpari scribunt Pollux, et Eustathius[5]. Gallinas gracillare diximus, alii pipare dicunt, Nonius pipare illis proprium esse, Varro Aboriginibus, ut idem Nonius[6] citat, Bos, inquit, mugit, Gallina pipat: et rursus[7]: Varro, inquit, pullos pipare dixit. Sed pullos Gallinaceos, et eiusmodi alios proprie pipire Columella[8] ait, sed pipare forte prisci dixerint. Nam apud Festum[9] legimus pipationem Oscorum lingua clamorem plorantis vocari. Dum incubant Gallinae, vocem mutant propter affectum pullorum, tunc enim acutior evadit. Eas rustici, teste Columella[10] glocientes appellant: Longolius crocitantes, Festus etiam glocire, et glocidare proprium Gallinis esse ait, quae incubaturae sunt. Hebraei, ut in syrochaldaico dictionario legere est גלוג ghelogh dicunt.

Julius Pollux and Eustathius write that the verb àidein - to sing - is specifically used for the singing of the roosters. I said that hens cluck, others say that they chirp, Nonius Marcellus says that chirping is a characteristic of them, Varro, in the Menippean satire Aborigines perì anthrópøn phýseøs, as Nonius himself quotes, says The ox lows, the hen chirps: and Nonius newly says: Varro said that chicks chirp. But Columella says that the chicks of chickens, and others of the same sort, properly peep, pipire, but perhaps the ancients said pipare. In fact in Festus we read that in the Oscan language is said pipatio the moan of a crying person. While hens are sitting on eggs they change their voice because of their affection for chicks, since then it becomes shriller. According to Columella, the farmers call them as clucking: Longolius says they croak, also Festus says that glocire and glocidare is proper to hens when they are about to incubate eggs. The Hebrews, as one may read in the Syro-Chaldaic dictionary, say ghelogh.

Κακκάζειν [11] vero dicuntur circa partum teste Hesychio, et Varino, et verbum est Atticum, cui simile est Germanorum gaggsen. Has Politianus[12], et Longolius singultire aiunt[13]. Pollux[14] vero hoc verbum de Meleagridum voce in usu esse scribit. Qua de causa quaerit Pamphilus in dialogo Gyb. Longolii[15], cur Gallina canturit, officinam cortalem petens. long. Non canturit, sed singultit. Hoc enim verbo Varro vocem Gallinarum {fractum} <fractam>[16], et intra {rostra} <rostrum> formatam imitatur. Rusticorum gens Columellae tempore glocire maluit dicere. pamp. Gallus etiam subinde {subgultit} <singultit>. long. Recte, sed cum cantat cucu<r>rire dicitur Latine, Graece autem κοκκύζειν. Haec Longolius; sed Columella, ut diximus, rusticos suo tempore glocientes vocasse scribit, quae incubant, quas, servato ad huc nomine, rustici Itali Chioccias vocant, nimirum a voce, et Belge, et audio Klok hennen. Recte vero Gallum, cum canit, cucurrire dixit.

Hesychius and Varinus testify, the hens kakkázein - to cackle, to cluck, to do the voice of partridge or of little owl - when are about to lay eggs, which is a verb of Attica, similar to gaggsen - today gagerzen - of Germans. Poliziano and Longolius say that they sob. But Julius Pollux writes that this verb is used for the voice of Guinea hens. Therefore Pamphilus in the dialogue of Gisbert Longolius asks why the hen sings softly when she goes towards the barnyard workshop. long. She does not sing softly, but sobs. For with this verb Varro imitates the broken voice of the hens and formed within the beak. The farmers of Columella’s day preferred to say glocire. pamph. Then also the rooster sobs. long. Correct, but when he crows it is said cucurrire in Latin and kokkýzein in Greek. This is what Longolius says; but Columella, as I said, writes that the farmers in his time called clucking those who are brooding, and the Italian farmers, the term having been kept until now, call them chiocce, doubtless from their voice, and I hear also klok hennen in Belgian language. But he correctly said cucurrire when the rooster is crowing.

Gallina etiam, cum eam est initurus Gallus, vocem format exilem, atque mancam. Hoc suadet experientia, si quis animadvertat, Gallinam a Gallo subsidere ad coitum patiendum, tunc enim eam is rostro ferit, qua desinit[17] collum, sed leviter nonnunquam, quod mordere vocabat Iuvenalis[18], qui simul eiusmodi Gallinae vocem angustam appellat, dum inquit:

Miratur vocem angustam, qua deterius nec

Ille sonat, {qua} <quo> mordetur Gallina marito{.}<?>

The hen also utters a shrill and faint voice when the rooster is about to mount her. Experience teaches us what follows: if one observes a hen crouched down by a rooster to undergo the coitus, he then strikes her with his beak where the neck ends - where the neck begins, at the nape -, but sometimes softly, which Juvenal called to bite, who at the same time calls the voice of such a hen as thin, when he says:

He is surprised at the thin voice, worse than which

not even he shouts when the hen is bitten by her husband?

Arbitror ego id generis vocem conformari ab ea Gallina, quotiescunque coitum aut invita patitur, aut Gallum non aeque redamat: nam hoc exemplo Satyricus[19] masculorum illorum vocem, qui Venerem damnatam patiuntur, de quibus loquitur in 4 superiore oratione. Licet vero Gallinae ita pro variis actionibus, ut dixi vocem immutent, nulla tamen cantus nomine digna videtur. Siquidem Aristoteles[20] in hoc avium genere cantum maribus tantum datum esse testatur, auditur tamen, inquit, aliquando faeminae cantus, et a faeminarum vulgo pro malo omine accipitur, adeo ut canentem iugulari velint. Et Terentius[21] pro ostento duci testis est, si Gallina cecinerit: inter monstra enim et hoc memorat: Gallina cecinit{,}<;> interdixit <h>ariolus. Quo loco Donatus[22] exponit obstetricum esse observationem, in qua domo Gallina canat[23].

I do think that a voice of this kind is worked out by the hen whenever she must undergo the coitus unwillingly or when she does not equally reciprocate the rooster’s affection: in fact the satiric poet – defines - with this example the voice of those males who are forced to undergo a intercourse, of whom he speaks in the previous - ? - fourth composition. But while hens, as I said, change to such an extent the voice according to various activities, nevertheless none of them seems to be worthy of song’s name. Since Aristotle asserts that in this genus of birds the song is ascribed only to males, and he says: nevertheless sometimes the song of the female is heard, and by women of common people it is taken as a bad omen, to such a degree that they wish the throat of a singing one is slit. Also Terence is witness that when a hen sang was considered a portent: for among prodigies he mentions also this: The hen sang; the soothsayer has forbidden. With regard to that, Aelius Donatus reports that there is existing a distrust by midwives in the home where a hen songs.

Galli vero cantus ἀλεκτοροφωνία Graecis dicitur, uti et tempus, quo canere incipit. Disputant nonnulli, an eiusmodi cantus inter euphonos, an potius inter dysphonos sit enumerandus. Angelus Politianus[24] refert Picum Baptistae Guarini nomine quaesivisse, cum Gallus {intenpestivum} <intempestivus> caneret, quo pacto illud vocis a Graecis diceretur. Etenim Iuvenalis meminit eius, et Quintilianus. Ego certe, inquit, mi Baptista, non aliud puto, quam quod aliquando reperi apud idoneos ἀπῳδὸν, quanquam mihi authores iam non succurrunt. Est vero ἀπῳδὸς ea vox etiam, quae neque choro, neque fidibus concordat. Haec ille: quibus innuere videtur, eiusmodi cantum harmoniae omnis prorsus expertem esse: et revera cucu<r>ritus ille nihil praeter molestum strepitum, insuavemque sonum prae se fert, et vix cantus nomine dignus est. Unde {Tragaedi} Tragoedi>[25] etiam κήρυκας <τοὺς> ἀλεκτρυόνας tanquam vocales, et clamosos praecones appellant, teste Eusthatio ἀπὸ τοῦ γαρύειν, id est, a vociferando. Nam dum cucu<r>rit, altum admodum exclamat, idque non solum interdiu, sed et noctu, ac tum statutis ferme horis. Ut vero maiorem, ut apparet, strepitum clamosa sua voce excitet, itaque iam iam cucu<r>riturus, alis ad latera collisis, ingentem ita sonitum edit, seipsumque ferit: quod ideo facere ipsum D. Gregorius[26] scribit, ut se vigilantem reddat.

But the rooster’s crow is said alektorophønía by Greeks, as is also said the time at which he begins to crow. Some dispute whether a song of this kind is to be numbered among euphonious or among cacophonous sounds. Angelo Poliziano says that Giovanni Pico della Mirandola on behalf of Battista Guarini asked him in what way was said by Greeks that kind of voice when a cock is crowing out of time. Because Juvenal mentioned it as well as Quintilian. “My dear Battista” he said “I do think that undoubtedly they do not say anything else but what sometimes I found in qualified texts, that is apøidòn - jarring, dissonant, absurd -, although the authors do not any longer cross my mind. Truly, apøidòs is also that voice which goes well neither with a chorus nor with a cithara.” Those are his words: by which it seems that he want to indicate that such a song is entirely devoid of any harmony, and in truth that cock-a-doodle-doo shows to be nothing but a bothersome cackling and an unpleasant sound, and hardly worthy of name of song. Hence the tragic poets call also heralds the cocks - kërykas <toùs> alektryónas - as they are loud and gaggling heralds, according to Eustathius, apò toû garýein, that is, from shouting. For, while he does a cock-a-doodle-doo, he shouts very loudly, and he is doing so not only during the day, but also at night, and during this time at approximately fixed hours. Then, in order to give rise, as it seems, to a greater noise using his cackling voice, and then when he is just about to crow, after he flapped the wings on flanks utters such a loud sound and strikes himself: and Saint Gregory writes that he does this to make himself watchful.

Sunt qui profunda nocte validius, matutino vero tempore remissius cantare putent, eius rei hanc rationem assignantes, quod cantus vero feratur, ventus autem noctu, quam sub crepusculum matutinum magis spiret, cuius beneficio longius audiatur. Utut est, media fere nocte canere, rursumque summo mane, tam clarum, ac notum est, ut supervacaneum sit super tali re authoritates veterum citare.

There are people who think he crows more loudly in the deep night, whereas more faintly towards morning, ascribing the reason of this to the fact that the song is carried, and the wind blows more during the night than towards morning’s twilight, and because of its favorable effect it is heard at a greater distance. Be that as it may, it is so evident and well-known that he sings at almost midnight and again at morning’s top, that it would be superfluous to quote in this regard the authority of the ancients.