We are like weathercocks, and have no fixed point, but can be turned by a passing breath.
|
|
In 1735 a storm completely flooded the settlement of San Augustín, Florida, and the viceroy sent aid. The year 1736 was disastrous for New Spain. Strong north winds uprooted trees and toppled weathercocks and crosses on the buildings. A comet appeared, provoking panic in the population, who feared it portended great disasters.
|
|
The Bayeux Tapestry of the 1070s depicts a man installing a cock on Westminster Abbey. One alternative theory about the origin of weathercocks on church steeples is that it was an emblem of the vigilance of the clergy calling the people to prayer.Thomas Ignatius M. Forster, Circle of the Seasons, p. 18 Another theory says that the cock was not a Christian symbolWilliam White, Notes and Queries but an emblem of the sunHargrave Jennings, Phallicism, p.
|
|
Salisbury criticised the foreign policy of Lord John Russell, claiming he was "always being willing to sacrifice anything for peace... colleagues, principles, pledges... a portentous mixture of bounce and baseness... dauntless to the weak, timid and cringing to the strong". The lessons to be learnt from Russell's foreign policy, Salisbury believed, were that he should not listen to the opposition or the press otherwise "we are to be governed… by a set of weathercocks, delicately poised, warranted to indicate with unnerving accuracy every variation in public feeling". Secondly: "No one dreams of conducting national affairs with the principles which are prescribed to individuals. The meek and poor-spirited among nations are not to be blessed, and the common sense of Christendom has always prescribed for national policy principles diametrically opposed to those that are laid down in the Sermon on the Mount".
|
|
The inscription on the fragment Sö 245, which is about 0.6 meters in height in the upright position, consists of runic text within a band and a depiction of a bird standing on what appears to be a cross. The depiction of the bird on the cross is very similar to that depicted on inscription Sö 270 in Tyresta, which has been interpreted as being a cock. p. 127-128. Placed on a cross, the cock would be interpreted as a Christian symbol meaning rebirth and vigilance, similar to weathercocks that are on top of churches today. Based upon the similarity to Sö 270, Sö 245 is attributed to a runemaster named Halfdan, which has been normalized as Halvdan, who placed his signature on Sö 270. Several other inscriptions are attributed to Halvdan based upon stylistic analysis include Sö 235 in Västerby, Sö 237 in Fors, Sö 239 in Häringe, Sö 244 in Tuna, the now-lost Sö 247 in Ålsta, Sö 252 in Säby, Sö 256 in Älby, Sö 262 in Blista, Sö 269 in Söderby Malm, Sö 272 in Upp-Norrby, Sö 274 in Södersluss, Sö 290 in Farsta, Sö 292 in Bröta, Sö 297 in Uppinge, Sö 298 in Uringe Malm, and Sö 301 in Ågesta Bro.
|
|