Pelican
Encyclopedia
A pelican, derived from the Greek word πελεκυς pelekys (meaning “axe” and applied to birds that cut wood with their bills or beaks) is a large water bird
with a large throat pouch, belonging to the bird
family
Pelecanidae.
Along with the darter
s, cormorant
s, gannet
s, boobies
, frigatebird
s, and tropicbird
s, pelicans make up the order
Pelecaniformes. Modern pelicans, of which there are eight species, are found on all continents except Antarctica. They primarily inhabit warm regions, though breeding ranges reach 45° south (Australian Pelican
, P. conspicillatus) and 60° North (American White Pelican
s, P. erythrorhynchos, in western Canada
). Birds of inland and coastal waters, they are absent from polar regions, the deep ocean, oceanic islands, and inland South America
.
(P. occidentalis), small individuals of which can be as little as 2.75 kg (6 lb), 106 cm (42 in) long and can have a wingspan of as little as 1.83 m (6 ft). The largest is believed to be the Dalmatian Pelican
(P. crispus), at up to 15 kg (33 lb), 183 cm (72 in) long, with a maximum wingspan of 3 meters (nearly 10 foot). The Australian Pelican has the longest bill of any bird.
Pelicans swim well with their short, strong legs and their feet with all four toes webbed (as in all birds placed in the order Pelecaniformes). The tail is short and square, with 20 to 24 feathers. The wings are long and have the unusually large number of 30 to 35 secondary flight feather
s. A layer of special fibers deep in the breast muscles can hold the wings rigidly horizontal for gliding and soaring. Thus they can exploit thermal
s to commute over 150 km (93.2 mi) to feeding areas.
Pelicans rub the backs of their heads on their preen glands to pick up their oily secretion, which they transfer to their plumage
to waterproof it.
, Dalmatian
, Great White, and American White Pelican
s), and those with gray or brown plumage, which nest in trees (Pink-backed
, Spot-billed
, and Brown
, plus the Peruvian Pelican
, which nests on sea rocks). The Peruvian Pelican is sometimes considered conspecific with the Brown Pelican.
, but they also eat amphibians, crustaceans and on some occasions, smaller birds. They often catch fish by expanding the throat pouch. Then they must drain the pouch above the surface before they can swallow. This operation takes up to a minute, during which time other seabirds are particularly likely to steal
the fish. Pelicans in their turn sometimes pirate prey from other seabirds.
The white pelicans often fish alone. They will form a line to chase schools of small fish into shallow water, and then scoop them up. Large fish are caught with the bill-tip, then tossed up in the air to be caught and slid into the gullet head first.
The Brown Pelican of North America usually plunge-dives for its prey. Rarely, other species such as the Peruvian Pelican and the Australian Pelican practice this method.
Consumption of other birds is rare. In 2006, footage of a pelican swallowing a living pigeon in St. James Park, London was captured, although such incidents had long claimed to happen there. According to tourists watching it, the pelican walked to the pigeon and grabbed it in its beak, hence starting the 20 minute struggle which ended when the victim was swallowed "head first down while flapping all the way down". A pelican in Zoo Basel
has been known to eat ducks. It has been suggested this feeding behaviour is more likely with captive birds that live in a semi-urban environment and are in constant close contact with humans, although it has been observed in the wild.
On the island of Malgas in South Africa, the biologist Marta de Ponte was the first to record Great White Pelicans eating Cape Gannet
chicks. The pelicans were then captured on film exhibiting this behaviour in the BBC
documentary Life (BBC TV series). The same species of pelican has been observed swallowing Cape cormorants, kelp gulls, swift terns and African penguins.
In all species copulation begins shortly after pairing and continues for 3 to 10 days before egg-laying. The male brings the nesting material, ground-nesters (which may not build a nest) sometimes in the pouch and tree-nesters crosswise in the bill. The female then heaps the material up to form a simple structure.
Both sexes incubate with the eggs on top of or below the feet. They may display when changing shifts. All species lay at least two eggs, and hatching success for undisturbed pairs can be as high as 95 percent, but because of competition between siblings or outright siblicide, usually all but one nestling dies within the first few weeks (or later in the Pink-backed and Spot-billed species). The young are fed copiously. Before or especially after being fed, they may seem to have a seizure
that ends in falling unconscious; the reason is not clearly known.
Parents of ground-nesting species have another strange behavior: they sometimes drag older young around roughly by the head before feeding them. The young of these species gather in "pods" or "crèches" of up to 100 birds in which parents recognize and feed only their own offspring. By 6 to 8 weeks they wander around, occasionally swimming, and may practice communal feeding.
Young of all species fledge 10 to 12 weeks after hatching. They may remain with their parents afterwards, but are now seldom or never fed. Overall breeding success is highly inconsistent.
Pairs are monogamous for a single season, but the pair bond extends only to the nesting area; mates are independent away from the nest.
and the Spot-billed Pelican
are the rarest species, with the population of the former estimated at between 10,000 and 20,000 and that of the latter at 13,000 to 18,000. The most common is believed to be the Australian Pelican, with a population generally estimated at around 400,000 individuals. However, estimates for the species have varied wildly between 100,000 and 1,000,000 over the years, and it is possible that the White Pelican, the population of which is more consistently estimated at 270,000 and 290,000 individuals, is in fact the more common species. The brown pelican may be even more numerous with estimates of 650,000 birds throughout its range. It has been removed from the endangered species list.
record it is known that pelicans have been around for over 30 million years, the earliest fossil Pelecanus being found in Oligocene
deposits in France. A prehistoric genus
has been named Miopelecanus
, while Protopelicanus may be a pelicanid or pelecaniform – or a similar aquatic bird such as a pseudotooth bird (Pelagornithidae). The supposed Miocene
pelican Liptornis from Argentina is a nomen dubium
, being based on hitherto indeterminable fragments.
A number of fossil
species are also known from the extant genus Pelecanus:
Europe
, the pelican was thought to be particularly attentive to her young, to the point of providing her own blood by wounding her own breast when no other food was available. As a result, the pelican became a symbol of the Passion
of Jesus
and of the Eucharist
. A reference to this mythical characteristic is contained for example in the hymn by Saint Thomas Aquinas, "Adoro te devote
" or "Humbly We Adore Thee", where in the penultimate verse he describes Christ as the "loving divine pelican". The self-sacrificial aspect of the pelican was re-inforced by the widely-read mediaeval bestiaries
. The device of "a pelican in her piety" or "a pelican vulning (from Latin vulno to wound) herself" was used in heraldry
. Another version of the myth is that the pelican used to kill its young then resurrect them with its blood, again analogous to the sacrifice of Jesus. The symbol of the Irish Blood Transfusion Service
(IBTS) is a pelican, and for most of its existence the headquarters of the service was located at Pelican House in Dublin, Ireland.
The emblems of both Corpus Christi College, Cambridge
, Corpus Christi College, Oxford
and the medical faculties of Charles University in Prague
are pelicans, showing its use as a medieval Christian symbol ('Corpus Christi' means 'body of Christ').
Likewise a folktale from India
says that a pelican killed her young by rough treatment but was then so contrite that she resurrected them with her own blood.
These legends may have arisen because pelicans look as if they are stabbing themselves as they often press their bill into their chest to fully empty their pouch. Other possibilities are that they often rest their bills on their breasts, and that the Dalmatian Pelican has a blood-red pouch in the early breeding season.
The symbol is used today as the national bird of Sint Maarten and features on its coat of arms
. It is also used on the Louisiana state flag
and Louisiana state seal
, as the Brown pelican
is the Louisiana state bird. The pelican is featured prominently on the seals of Loomis Chaffee
, Louisiana State University
, and Tulane University
, and is also the mascot of Tulane. A pelican logo is used by the Portuguese
bank
Montepio Geral
.http://www.montepio.pt/
The Moche
people of ancient Peru
worshipped nature. They placed emphasis on animals and often depicted pelicans in their art.
A pelican is depicted on the reverse
of the Albanian 1 lek
coin, issued in 1996.
Bird
Birds are feathered, winged, bipedal, endothermic , egg-laying, vertebrate animals. Around 10,000 living species and 188 families makes them the most speciose class of tetrapod vertebrates. They inhabit ecosystems across the globe, from the Arctic to the Antarctic. Extant birds range in size from...
with a large throat pouch, belonging to the bird
Bird
Birds are feathered, winged, bipedal, endothermic , egg-laying, vertebrate animals. Around 10,000 living species and 188 families makes them the most speciose class of tetrapod vertebrates. They inhabit ecosystems across the globe, from the Arctic to the Antarctic. Extant birds range in size from...
family
Family (biology)
In biological classification, family is* a taxonomic rank. Other well-known ranks are life, domain, kingdom, phylum, class, order, genus, and species, with family fitting between order and genus. As for the other well-known ranks, there is the option of an immediately lower rank, indicated by the...
Pelecanidae.
Along with the darter
Darter
The darters or snakebirds are mainly tropical waterbirds in the family Anhingidae. There are four living species, three of which are very common and widespread while the fourth is rarer and classified as near-threatened by the IUCN. The term "snakebird" is usually used without any additions to...
s, cormorant
Cormorant
The bird family Phalacrocoracidae is represented by some 40 species of cormorants and shags. Several different classifications of the family have been proposed recently, and the number of genera is disputed.- Names :...
s, gannet
Gannet
Gannets are seabirds comprising the genus Morus, in the family Sulidae, closely related to the boobies.The gannets are large black and white birds with yellow heads. They have long pointed wings and long bills. Northern gannets are the largest seabirds in the North Atlantic, with a wingspan of up...
s, boobies
Booby
A booby is a seabird in the genus Sula, part of the Sulidae family. Boobies are closely related to the gannets , which were formerly included in Sula.-Description:...
, frigatebird
Frigatebird
The frigatebirds are a family, Fregatidae, of seabirds. There are five species in the single genus Fregata. They are also sometimes called Man of War birds or Pirate birds. Since they are related to the pelicans, the term "frigate pelican" is also a name applied to them...
s, and tropicbird
Tropicbird
Tropicbirds are a family, Phaethontidae, of tropical pelagic seabirds now classified in their own order Phaethontiformes. Their relationship to other living birds is unclear, and they appear to have no close relatives. There are three species in one genus, Phaethon...
s, pelicans make up the order
Order (biology)
In scientific classification used in biology, the order is# a taxonomic rank used in the classification of organisms. Other well-known ranks are life, domain, kingdom, phylum, class, family, genus, and species, with order fitting in between class and family...
Pelecaniformes. Modern pelicans, of which there are eight species, are found on all continents except Antarctica. They primarily inhabit warm regions, though breeding ranges reach 45° south (Australian Pelican
Australian Pelican
The Australian Pelican is a large water bird, widespread on the inland and coastal waters of Australia and New Guinea, also in Fiji, parts of Indonesia and as a vagrant to New Zealand.-Taxonomy:...
, P. conspicillatus) and 60° North (American White Pelican
American White Pelican
The American White Pelican is a large aquatic bird from the order Pelecaniformes. It breeds in interior North America, moving south and to the coasts, as far as Central America, in winter....
s, P. erythrorhynchos, in western Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
). Birds of inland and coastal waters, they are absent from polar regions, the deep ocean, oceanic islands, and inland South America
South America
South America is a continent situated in the Western Hemisphere, mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere. The continent is also considered a subcontinent of the Americas. It is bordered on the west by the Pacific Ocean and on the north and east...
.
Description
Pelicans are large birds with large pouched bills. The smallest is the Brown PelicanBrown Pelican
The Brown Pelican is the smallest of the eight species of pelican, although it is a large bird in nearly every other regard. It is in length, weighs from and has a wingspan from .-Range and habits:...
(P. occidentalis), small individuals of which can be as little as 2.75 kg (6 lb), 106 cm (42 in) long and can have a wingspan of as little as 1.83 m (6 ft). The largest is believed to be the Dalmatian Pelican
Dalmatian Pelican
The Dalmatian Pelican is a member of the pelican family. It breeds from southeastern Europe to India and China in swamps and shallow lakes. The nest is a crude heap of vegetation....
(P. crispus), at up to 15 kg (33 lb), 183 cm (72 in) long, with a maximum wingspan of 3 meters (nearly 10 foot). The Australian Pelican has the longest bill of any bird.
Pelicans swim well with their short, strong legs and their feet with all four toes webbed (as in all birds placed in the order Pelecaniformes). The tail is short and square, with 20 to 24 feathers. The wings are long and have the unusually large number of 30 to 35 secondary flight feather
Flight feather
Flight feathers are the long, stiff, asymmetrically shaped, but symmetrically paired feathers on the wings or tail of a bird; those on the wings are called remiges while those on the tail are called rectrices . Their primary function is to aid in the generation of both thrust and lift, thereby...
s. A layer of special fibers deep in the breast muscles can hold the wings rigidly horizontal for gliding and soaring. Thus they can exploit thermal
Thermal
A thermal column is a column of rising air in the lower altitudes of the Earth's atmosphere. Thermals are created by the uneven heating of the Earth's surface from solar radiation, and are an example of convection. The sun warms the ground, which in turn warms the air directly above it...
s to commute over 150 km (93.2 mi) to feeding areas.
Pelicans rub the backs of their heads on their preen glands to pick up their oily secretion, which they transfer to their plumage
Plumage
Plumage refers both to the layer of feathers that cover a bird and the pattern, colour, and arrangement of those feathers. The pattern and colours of plumage vary between species and subspecies and can also vary between different age classes, sexes, and season. Within species there can also be a...
to waterproof it.
Sub-groups
The pelicans can be divided into two groups: those with mostly white adult plumage, which nest on the ground (AustralianAustralian Pelican
The Australian Pelican is a large water bird, widespread on the inland and coastal waters of Australia and New Guinea, also in Fiji, parts of Indonesia and as a vagrant to New Zealand.-Taxonomy:...
, Dalmatian
Dalmatian Pelican
The Dalmatian Pelican is a member of the pelican family. It breeds from southeastern Europe to India and China in swamps and shallow lakes. The nest is a crude heap of vegetation....
, Great White, and American White Pelican
American White Pelican
The American White Pelican is a large aquatic bird from the order Pelecaniformes. It breeds in interior North America, moving south and to the coasts, as far as Central America, in winter....
s), and those with gray or brown plumage, which nest in trees (Pink-backed
Pink-backed Pelican
The Pink-backed Pelican is a member of the pelican family of birds. It is a resident breeder in Africa, southern Arabia and apparently extinct in Madagascar in swamps and shallow lakes.-Description:...
, Spot-billed
Spot-billed Pelican
The Spot-billed Pelican or Grey Pelican is a member of the pelican family. It breeds in southern Asia from southern Pakistan across India east to Indonesia. It is a bird of large inland and coastal waters, especially large lakes...
, and Brown
Brown Pelican
The Brown Pelican is the smallest of the eight species of pelican, although it is a large bird in nearly every other regard. It is in length, weighs from and has a wingspan from .-Range and habits:...
, plus the Peruvian Pelican
Peruvian Pelican
The Peruvian Pelican, Pelecanus thagus, is a member of the pelican family. It lives on the west coast of South America, from Lobos de Tierra Island in Peru to Pupuya Islet in Chile....
, which nests on sea rocks). The Peruvian Pelican is sometimes considered conspecific with the Brown Pelican.
Feeding
The diet of a Pelican usually consists of fishFish
Fish are a paraphyletic group of organisms that consist of all gill-bearing aquatic vertebrate animals that lack limbs with digits. Included in this definition are the living hagfish, lampreys, and cartilaginous and bony fish, as well as various extinct related groups...
, but they also eat amphibians, crustaceans and on some occasions, smaller birds. They often catch fish by expanding the throat pouch. Then they must drain the pouch above the surface before they can swallow. This operation takes up to a minute, during which time other seabirds are particularly likely to steal
Kleptoparasitism
Kleptoparasitism or cleptoparasitism is a form of feeding in which one animal takes prey or other food from another that has caught, collected, or otherwise prepared the food, including stored food...
the fish. Pelicans in their turn sometimes pirate prey from other seabirds.
The white pelicans often fish alone. They will form a line to chase schools of small fish into shallow water, and then scoop them up. Large fish are caught with the bill-tip, then tossed up in the air to be caught and slid into the gullet head first.
The Brown Pelican of North America usually plunge-dives for its prey. Rarely, other species such as the Peruvian Pelican and the Australian Pelican practice this method.
Consumption of other birds is rare. In 2006, footage of a pelican swallowing a living pigeon in St. James Park, London was captured, although such incidents had long claimed to happen there. According to tourists watching it, the pelican walked to the pigeon and grabbed it in its beak, hence starting the 20 minute struggle which ended when the victim was swallowed "head first down while flapping all the way down". A pelican in Zoo Basel
Zoo Basel
Zoo Basel is a non-profit zoo located within the city of Basel, Switzerland. Its official name is Zoologischer Garten Basel — or in English: Basel Zoological Garden. Basel residents, however, call their zoo affectionately Zolli...
has been known to eat ducks. It has been suggested this feeding behaviour is more likely with captive birds that live in a semi-urban environment and are in constant close contact with humans, although it has been observed in the wild.
On the island of Malgas in South Africa, the biologist Marta de Ponte was the first to record Great White Pelicans eating Cape Gannet
Cape Gannet
The Cape Gannet, Morus capensis, originally Sula capensis, is a large seabird of the gannet family, Sulidae.They are easily identified by their large size, black and white plumage and distinctive yellow crown and hindneck...
chicks. The pelicans were then captured on film exhibiting this behaviour in the BBC
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
documentary Life (BBC TV series). The same species of pelican has been observed swallowing Cape cormorants, kelp gulls, swift terns and African penguins.
Reproduction
Pelicans are gregarious and nest colonially. The ground-nesting (white) species have a complex communal courtship involving a group of males chasing a single female in the air, on land, or in the water while pointing, gaping, and thrusting their bills at each other. They can finish the process in a day. The tree-nesting species have a simpler process in which perched males advertise for females.In all species copulation begins shortly after pairing and continues for 3 to 10 days before egg-laying. The male brings the nesting material, ground-nesters (which may not build a nest) sometimes in the pouch and tree-nesters crosswise in the bill. The female then heaps the material up to form a simple structure.
Both sexes incubate with the eggs on top of or below the feet. They may display when changing shifts. All species lay at least two eggs, and hatching success for undisturbed pairs can be as high as 95 percent, but because of competition between siblings or outright siblicide, usually all but one nestling dies within the first few weeks (or later in the Pink-backed and Spot-billed species). The young are fed copiously. Before or especially after being fed, they may seem to have a seizure
Seizure
An epileptic seizure, occasionally referred to as a fit, is defined as a transient symptom of "abnormal excessive or synchronous neuronal activity in the brain". The outward effect can be as dramatic as a wild thrashing movement or as mild as a brief loss of awareness...
that ends in falling unconscious; the reason is not clearly known.
Parents of ground-nesting species have another strange behavior: they sometimes drag older young around roughly by the head before feeding them. The young of these species gather in "pods" or "crèches" of up to 100 birds in which parents recognize and feed only their own offspring. By 6 to 8 weeks they wander around, occasionally swimming, and may practice communal feeding.
Young of all species fledge 10 to 12 weeks after hatching. They may remain with their parents afterwards, but are now seldom or never fed. Overall breeding success is highly inconsistent.
Pairs are monogamous for a single season, but the pair bond extends only to the nesting area; mates are independent away from the nest.
Populations
The Dalmatian PelicanDalmatian Pelican
The Dalmatian Pelican is a member of the pelican family. It breeds from southeastern Europe to India and China in swamps and shallow lakes. The nest is a crude heap of vegetation....
and the Spot-billed Pelican
Spot-billed Pelican
The Spot-billed Pelican or Grey Pelican is a member of the pelican family. It breeds in southern Asia from southern Pakistan across India east to Indonesia. It is a bird of large inland and coastal waters, especially large lakes...
are the rarest species, with the population of the former estimated at between 10,000 and 20,000 and that of the latter at 13,000 to 18,000. The most common is believed to be the Australian Pelican, with a population generally estimated at around 400,000 individuals. However, estimates for the species have varied wildly between 100,000 and 1,000,000 over the years, and it is possible that the White Pelican, the population of which is more consistently estimated at 270,000 and 290,000 individuals, is in fact the more common species. The brown pelican may be even more numerous with estimates of 650,000 birds throughout its range. It has been removed from the endangered species list.
Species
From the fossilFossil
Fossils are the preserved remains or traces of animals , plants, and other organisms from the remote past...
record it is known that pelicans have been around for over 30 million years, the earliest fossil Pelecanus being found in Oligocene
Oligocene
The Oligocene is a geologic epoch of the Paleogene Period and extends from about 34 million to 23 million years before the present . As with other older geologic periods, the rock beds that define the period are well identified but the exact dates of the start and end of the period are slightly...
deposits in France. A prehistoric genus
Genus
In biology, a genus is a low-level taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms, which is an example of definition by genus and differentia...
has been named Miopelecanus
Miopelecanus
Miopelecanus is an extinct genus of pelican....
, while Protopelicanus may be a pelicanid or pelecaniform – or a similar aquatic bird such as a pseudotooth bird (Pelagornithidae). The supposed Miocene
Miocene
The Miocene is a geological epoch of the Neogene Period and extends from about . The Miocene was named by Sir Charles Lyell. Its name comes from the Greek words and and means "less recent" because it has 18% fewer modern sea invertebrates than the Pliocene. The Miocene follows the Oligocene...
pelican Liptornis from Argentina is a nomen dubium
Nomen dubium
In zoological nomenclature, a nomen dubium is a scientific name that is of unknown or doubtful application...
, being based on hitherto indeterminable fragments.
A number of fossil
Fossil
Fossils are the preserved remains or traces of animals , plants, and other organisms from the remote past...
species are also known from the extant genus Pelecanus:
- Pelecanus halieus (Late Pliocene of Idaho, USA)
- Pelecanus cadimurka
- Pelecanus cauleyi
- Pelecanus gracilis
- Pelecanus halieus
- Pelecanus intermedius
- Pelecanus lazerus
- Pelecanus odessanus
- Pelecanus schreiberi
- Pelecanus sivalensis
- Pelecanus tirarensis
Religious symbolism and popular culture
In medievalMiddle Ages
The Middle Ages is a periodization of European history from the 5th century to the 15th century. The Middle Ages follows the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 and precedes the Early Modern Era. It is the middle period of a three-period division of Western history: Classic, Medieval and Modern...
Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...
, the pelican was thought to be particularly attentive to her young, to the point of providing her own blood by wounding her own breast when no other food was available. As a result, the pelican became a symbol of the Passion
Passion (Christianity)
The Passion is the Christian theological term used for the events and suffering – physical, spiritual, and mental – of Jesus in the hours before and including his trial and execution by crucifixion...
of Jesus
Jesus
Jesus of Nazareth , commonly referred to as Jesus Christ or simply as Jesus or Christ, is the central figure of Christianity...
and of the Eucharist
Eucharist
The Eucharist , also called Holy Communion, the Sacrament of the Altar, the Blessed Sacrament, the Lord's Supper, and other names, is a Christian sacrament or ordinance...
. A reference to this mythical characteristic is contained for example in the hymn by Saint Thomas Aquinas, "Adoro te devote
Adoro te devote
Adoro te devote is a Eucharistic hymn written by Saint Thomas Aquinas.The Latin original is as follows:The sixth verse "Pie Pelicane, Jesu, Domine" is sometimes used as a separate hymn during Benediction....
" or "Humbly We Adore Thee", where in the penultimate verse he describes Christ as the "loving divine pelican". The self-sacrificial aspect of the pelican was re-inforced by the widely-read mediaeval bestiaries
Bestiary
A bestiary, or Bestiarum vocabulum is a compendium of beasts. Bestiaries were made popular in the Middle Ages in illustrated volumes that described various animals, birds and even rocks. The natural history and illustration of each beast was usually accompanied by a moral lesson...
. The device of "a pelican in her piety" or "a pelican vulning (from Latin vulno to wound) herself" was used in heraldry
Heraldry
Heraldry is the profession, study, or art of creating, granting, and blazoning arms and ruling on questions of rank or protocol, as exercised by an officer of arms. Heraldry comes from Anglo-Norman herald, from the Germanic compound harja-waldaz, "army commander"...
. Another version of the myth is that the pelican used to kill its young then resurrect them with its blood, again analogous to the sacrifice of Jesus. The symbol of the Irish Blood Transfusion Service
Irish Blood Transfusion Service
The Irish Blood Transfusion Service , or Seirbhís Fuilaistriúcháin na hÉireann in Irish, was established in the Republic of Ireland as the Blood Transfusion Service Board by the Blood Transfusion Service Board Order, 1965, it took its current name in April 2000 by Statutory Instrument issued by...
(IBTS) is a pelican, and for most of its existence the headquarters of the service was located at Pelican House in Dublin, Ireland.
The emblems of both Corpus Christi College, Cambridge
Corpus Christi College, Cambridge
Corpus Christi College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge. It is notable as the only college founded by Cambridge townspeople: it was established in 1352 by the Guilds of Corpus Christi and the Blessed Virgin Mary...
, Corpus Christi College, Oxford
Corpus Christi College, Oxford
Corpus Christi College is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom...
and the medical faculties of Charles University in Prague
Charles University in Prague
Charles University in Prague is the oldest and largest university in the Czech Republic. Founded in 1348, it was the first university in Central Europe and is also considered the earliest German university...
are pelicans, showing its use as a medieval Christian symbol ('Corpus Christi' means 'body of Christ').
Likewise a folktale from India
India
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
says that a pelican killed her young by rough treatment but was then so contrite that she resurrected them with her own blood.
These legends may have arisen because pelicans look as if they are stabbing themselves as they often press their bill into their chest to fully empty their pouch. Other possibilities are that they often rest their bills on their breasts, and that the Dalmatian Pelican has a blood-red pouch in the early breeding season.
The symbol is used today as the national bird of Sint Maarten and features on its coat of arms
Coat of arms of Sint Maarten
The coat of arms of the Sint Maarten consists of a shield with a rising sun and the motto. The shield displays the courthouse in the centre, the border monument to the right, the orange-yellow sage to the left. Flying in front of the rising sun is the pelican, which is the national bird of Sint...
. It is also used on the Louisiana state flag
Flag of Louisiana
The flag of Louisiana consists of a heraldic charge called a "pelican in her piety," representing a mother pelican wounding her breast to feed her young from the blood. This symbol, emblematic of Christian charity, is also found on the state seal. On the flag it is depicted above a ribbon with the...
and Louisiana state seal
Seal of Louisiana
The Great Seal of the State of Louisiana was adopted as the official state seal of Louisiana in 1902. The seal consists of a heraldic charge called a "pelican in her piety," representing a Brown Pelican representing a mother pelican wounding her breast to feed her young from her own blood...
, as the Brown pelican
Brown Pelican
The Brown Pelican is the smallest of the eight species of pelican, although it is a large bird in nearly every other regard. It is in length, weighs from and has a wingspan from .-Range and habits:...
is the Louisiana state bird. The pelican is featured prominently on the seals of Loomis Chaffee
Loomis Chaffee
The Loomis Chaffee School is a premier coeducational boarding school for grades 9–12 and postgraduates located on a 300-plus acre campus in the Connecticut River Valley in Windsor, Connecticut, six miles north of Hartford...
, Louisiana State University
Louisiana State University
Louisiana State University and Agricultural and Mechanical College, most often referred to as Louisiana State University, or LSU, is a public coeducational university located in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. The University was founded in 1853 in what is now known as Pineville, Louisiana, under the name...
, and Tulane University
Tulane University
Tulane University is a private, nonsectarian research university located in New Orleans, Louisiana, United States...
, and is also the mascot of Tulane. A pelican logo is used by the Portuguese
Portugal
Portugal , officially the Portuguese Republic is a country situated in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula. Portugal is the westernmost country of Europe, and is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the West and South and by Spain to the North and East. The Atlantic archipelagos of the...
bank
Bank
A bank is a financial institution that serves as a financial intermediary. The term "bank" may refer to one of several related types of entities:...
Montepio Geral
Montepio Geral
Montepio Geral - Associação Mutualista, is the head of a group of the Social Economy: Montepio Group. The group of companies that constitutes aims to assist the achievement of the purposes of the Mutual Benefit Association, through results that support the income of the methods endorsed by...
.http://www.montepio.pt/
The Moche
Moche
'The Moche civilization flourished in northern Peru from about 100 AD to 800 AD, during the Regional Development Epoch. While this issue is the subject of some debate, many scholars contend that the Moche were not politically organized as a monolithic empire or state...
people of ancient Peru
Peru
Peru , officially the Republic of Peru , is a country in western South America. It is bordered on the north by Ecuador and Colombia, on the east by Brazil, on the southeast by Bolivia, on the south by Chile, and on the west by the Pacific Ocean....
worshipped nature. They placed emphasis on animals and often depicted pelicans in their art.
A pelican is depicted on the reverse
Obverse and reverse
Obverse and its opposite, reverse, refer to the two flat faces of coins and some other two-sided objects, including paper money, flags , seals, medals, drawings, old master prints and other works of art, and printed fabrics. In this usage, obverse means the front face of the object and reverse...
of the Albanian 1 lek
Albanian lek
The lek is the official currency of Albania. It is subdivided into 100 qindarka , although qindarka are no longer issued.-Names:...
coin, issued in 1996.
External links
- The Symbolism of the Pelican article in the Arlington Catholic Herald.
- Pelican videos on the Internet Bird Collection