Las aves ibéricas en la cultura popular

There can be no doubt that birds are one of the vital pillars of popular culture. Their distinctive appearance, bright colours, enchanting song, ubiquitous presence and their very familiarity have made them an indispensable ingredient of tradition and folklore. Sayings, refrains, poems, songs, stories and legends contain an inexhaustible fund of knowledge and belief about the lives of birds, their relationship with people and other animals, with the weather, the success of agriculture and even the prediction of the future. In the modern world, however, the immense cultural legacy, which has been passed down through generations, is in danger of being lost. The decline of traditional rural life, the flight of populations to the cities, the generalized retreat from nature and country life and the extinguishing of the hearth around which fables and old wives’ tales were recounted on winter nights, we risk losing these wonderful treasures, without having the chance to record more than the tiniest fraction of their glory. In this context the author offers us the fruits of years of tireless study; the first wide-ranging compilation dedicated to the mark made by Iberian birds in the field of popular culture. The book owes a debt to the collaboration of the hundreds of people who have brought information from all Spain and Portugal’s nooks and crannies, in all the variegated voices and languages of the peninsula. This work will be of equal interest to ornithologists, naturalists, linguists and those who are passionate about ethnography and folklore, as well as bird lovers in general and anyone who cares about culture and tradition. Reading it, you feel possessed by the author’s urgent passion to cling on to and preserve the legacy of our parents and grandparents while there is still time.