The ‘Black Gentry’

Between the Restoration and the Second World War, rookeries had a special status in Britain and Ireland. They were closely associated with landowning families and rooks were protected in parks and large grounds. This strong form of identification opened the way to unusual popular beliefs around the rookery. There was particularly the notion that rooks deserted a rookery either as a reaction to bad news in ‘their’ family or as an omen of bad things to come. This article explores these beliefs, showing how they were the most visible part of a wider belief system about sympathy between bird and landowner. The article finishes by reflecting on the nature of ‘superstition’ from c.1660 to c.1950. AcknowledgementsI thank my father Stephen Young, Mark Cocker, Davide Ermacora, Jessica Hemming, Ron James, Najla Kay, Bob Skinner, Chris Woodyard, and the two anonymous peer reviewers for help with this article. Much of this material was presented in a talk at the sixteenth Legendary Weekend of The Folklore Society in Knaresborough, North Yorkshire (September 2022).Notes1 This originates in Bigge (Citation1860–62, 92), is picked up by Henderson (Citation1866, 116), and is transmitted from there to, among others, Swainson (Citation1885, 87), Radford and Radford (Citation1949, 204), and Newall (Citation2015, 52–53); for a sceptical reaction see Safa (Citation1867).2 See Macbeth 3.2; although read with Dewhirst (Citation2016); note also ‘rooky, a.2’ in the OED ‘foggy, misty’. See Tennyson, ‘Locksley Hall’ (Citation1855, 188); for background, see Luce (Citation1895, 198).3 ‘Only the other day a venerable crossing keeper informed me that carrion crows were nothing more than outcasts from a rookery living the life of vagrants’ (Brierley Citation1902).4 I have used the word ‘landowners’ to refer to the more prestigious elements in agricultural society, who often kept rookeries. These included in our period the aristocracy, squires, and the independently wealthy. I have put against these ‘the farmers’, by which I mean small landowners and tenants, who were often hostile to rooks.5 For the relevant text, related to Bellingsbere in Berkshire: ‘si moltiplica facilmente la specie, come ancora quella de’ corvi, che si considerano nell’Inghilterra uccelli di riservo, pregiandosi quella nobiltà di vedere in vicinanza delle ville questi volatili, da loro reputati di buon augurio, e perciò sotto rigoroso divieto non è permesso ad alcuno l’ammazzarli’ (Crinò Citation1968, 112).6 The Adventures of Lucifer in London (page 34), no publisher and undated but 1780s.7 The ubiquity of this phrase makes one wonder whether in an earlier age rooks were compared to British monks. It is certainly striking how often ‘rookery’ is applied to ecclesiastical gatherings in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries (e.g. ‘London’ 1835). There is a phrase frequently ascribed (apparently without justification) to John Knox in the nineteenth century: ‘to dislodge the rooks you must pull down the rookery’ (Brown Citation1855, 107). This could have easily been used in a Reformation context, but I have found no Reformation-era evidence. We have again the relative absence of the rookery in writing prior to about 1700.8 André-Jacques Garnerin (1769–1823) was a pioneering French balloonist and parachutist.9 For a legend about seagulls, see Swainson (Citation1885, 204–205); for eagles, see ‘Bird Lore’ (Citation1924). I am sceptical about Smith’s comment: ‘To this day, in England, the prosperity of many a great family is supposed to depend upon the safety of the raven which has deigned to make his domicile under its protection’ (Smith Citation1905, 113). Probably confusion with rooks? If there really is a tradition of ravens and luck, as Sax (Citation2011, 43–45) implies, I would suggest this is an older, crueller custom, suited to a period of endemic civil war, replaced by the kinder rooks in the stability that followed the Restoration. One other example is the problematic but fascinating legend of the ravens at the Tower of London and the idea that their desertion will mark the fall of Britain. It is difficult to date the ravens there back before the nineteenth century and the earliest trace of the legend around their desertion is apparently from 1944 (Sax Citation2011, 65). It might be noted that there was briefly a rookery at the Tower in the 1810s (‘Revolution’ Citation1815). Might this have contributed to a growing legend around the Tower and national destiny? For the idea that rooks’ desertion of royal sites might have national consequences, see ‘From the Dispersion ...’ (1809).10 (1) Hastings, Sussex: Marwick (Citation1791, 127–28); (2) Whitehaven, Cumbria: ‘The Large Rookery’ (Citation1819); (3) Brighton, Sussex: ‘From the Dispersion ...’ (Citation1819); (4) Essex: ‘Rooks’ (Citation1826); (5) Co. Mayo: ‘Singular’ (1832); (6) location unknown: ‘Talking’ (1844); (7) Cork: Gibson (Citation1861, 2: 436); (8) Darlington, Co. Durham: ‘Darlington’ (Citation1861); (9) Chipchase, Northumberland: Bigge (Citation1860–62, 92); (10) Scotland: P. C. B. (Citation1863); (11) location unknown: ‘The Echo ...’ (Citation1873); (12) location unknown: ‘Superstitions’ (Citation1875); (13) Tattershall, Lincolnshire: R. R. (Citation1879); (14) Shropshire: Jackson and Burne (Citation1885); (15) London: ‘Rooks’ (Citation1892); (16) location unknown: Whiting (Citation1899); (17) Lichfield, Staffordshire: Church (Citation1900, 218); (18) location unknown: B. C. (Citation1902); (19) Chilton Candover, Hampshire: ‘The Desertion’ (Citation1904); (20) Winchester, Hampshire: ‘The Desertion’ (1904); (21) Candover House, Hampshire: ‘Strange’ (Citation1904); (22) ‘the north’: ‘British Wild Life’ (Citation1904); (23) Weston-Super-Mare, Somerset: Werge (Citation1904); (24) Bishop’s Auckland, Co. Durham: Smith (Citation1905, 384); (25) Heworth, Yorkshire: ‘The Return’ (Citation1905); (26) Branston, Lincolnshire: E. S. M. (1905); (27) Warwickshire: ‘Nature Notes’ (April Citation1907); (28) location unknown: ‘Country Life’ (Citation1908) (29) location unknown: One Interested (Citation1916); (30) Limber, Lincolnshire: Richardson (Citation1919, 118); (31) Corringham, Lincolnshire: Peacock and Fowler (Citation2010), prior to 1920; (32) Scotland: ‘Bird Lore’ (Citation1924); (33) location unknown: ‘Birds’ (Citation1926); (34) Lincolnshire: ‘The Following Letter ...’ (Citation1930); and (35) Co. Limerick: NFCS 489:225; Tadhg Ó Duinneachair (52), Knockaderry, Co. Limerick. Collector: Eamonn Ó Duinneachair, Áth an Lín (B.), Baile an Gharrdha, Co. Limerick, 1938–39. Teacher: Michael de Búrca. These sources have all been included in a sourcebook (Young Citation2023).11 NFCS 559:225; Miss Eliza Carrigg (no age given), Kilrush, Co. Clare. Collector: not given, Ballycar, Cuinche, 1934-1938. Teacher: Liam Mac Clúin.Additional informationNotes on contributorsSimon YoungSimon Young is a British historian based in Italy. He published in 2023 The Boggart: Folklore, Place-Names, History and Dialect with Exeter University Press and, in the same year, The Nail in the Skull and other Victorian Urban Legends with the University Press of Mississippi

Ancestor · Archaeology · Art · Folklore · Genealogy · Gentry · Indulgence · Literature · Political science · Rookery · Skepticism · Sociology · Superstition · Theology · Classics · Demography · Folklore, Mythology, and Literature Studies · Geographies of human-animal interactions · History · Law · Philosophy

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