#archilochus

[herpsandbirds]

Ruby-throated Hummingbird (Archilochus colubris) albino, family Trochilidae, Fort Wayne, Indiana, USA

photograph by ryany1117

[447755]

[terrorignitis]

Pain strikes one, then another. Now it turns to us and we groan over a bloody wound; next it'll turn to someone else. So now endure, driving back womanly grief.

Archilochos Lyric

[haveyouseenthisbirdpoll]

Have you seen a Ruby-throated hummingbird (Archilochus colubris)?

Yes, in nature

Yes, in captivity

No, only in pictures/taxidermy/I've only heard of it

No, I have never heard of this bird

No, but I have heard one

I might have/I'm not sure

Voting ended onMay 24, 2024

photo source

[mostlydeadlanguages]

On Foxes

eṭlu ša sibbat nēši iṣbatuni ina nāri iṭṭubu ša sibbat šēlebi iṣbatuni ussēzib "The man who seized the lion’s tail sank in the river; he who seized the fox’s tail was saved." — ABL 555 r.3-6 (Neo-Assyrian cuneiform letter, date and name missing)

πόλλ' οἶδ' ἀλώπηξ, ἀλλ' ἐχῖνος ἓν μέγα “The fox knows many things, but the hedgehog one big thing.” (Archilochus, 7th c. BCE)

“We communicate like the burrows of foxes, in silence and darkness, under ground.” — Henry David Thoreau, letter to Ralph Waldo Emerson, February 12, 1843

“Be like the fox who makes more tracks than necessary, some in the wrong direction. Practice resurrection.” — Wendell Berry, “Manifesto: The Mad Farmer Liberation Front,” 1970

[best-bird-tournament]

Archilochus hummingbird

Which is the best bird?

Ruby-throated hummingbird

Black-chinned hummingbird

Voting ended onJun 23, 2025

[bones-ivy-breath]

The First Cologne Epode by Archilochus (tr. Peter Bing and Rip Cohen), from Games of Venus: An Anthology of Greek and Roman Erotic Verse from Sappho to Ovid

[hanssloane]

The fox knows many tricks, the hedgehog only one—but it’s a big one.

- Archilochus