Stork ("Ḥasidah")

Unclean bird (Lev. xi. 19; Deut. xiv. 18). The name (comp. Latin, "pia avis") alludes to the filial piety and devotion attributed by the ancients to the stork (comp. Aristotle, "Historia Animalium," ix. 14, 1). Both the white and black storks (Ciconia alba and Ciconia nigra) occur in Palestine: the former is a migrant, passing through in April (comp. Jer. viii. 7); the latter is especially abundant in the neighborhood of the Dead Sea.

The Talmud considers "dayyah lebanah" to be the proper name of the stork, and "ḥasidah" to be an epithet applied to it because it lovingly shares its food with its fellows (Ḥul. 63a). The gall of the stork cures the bite of the scorpion (Ket. 50a; comp. Pliny, "Historia Naturalis," xxix. 5, 33).

Bibliography:

  * Tristram, Nat. Hist. p. 244;
  * Lewysohn, Zoologie des Talmuds, p. 171.



E. G. H. I. M. C.