Swan song: Difference between revisions

[[File:Gravure door Reinier van Persijn.jpg|thumb|right|"''The singing swan''" (1655) by [[Reinier van Persijn]].]]

The '''swan song''' ([[ancient Greek]]: {{lang-grc|κύκνειον ᾆσμα}}; [[Latin]]: ''{{lang-la|carmen cygni''}}) is a [[metaphor]]ical phrase for a final gesture, effort, or performance given just before [[death]] or [[retirement]]. The phrase refers to an ancient belief that [[swan]]s sing a beautiful song just before their death sincewhile they have been silent (or alternatively not so musical) for most of their lifetime. The belief, whose basis has been long debated, had become [[proverb]]ialproverbial in [[ancient Greece]] by the 5th to 3rd centuriescentury BC and was reiterated many times in later [[Western culture|Western]] poetry and art. Swans learn a variety of sounds throughout their lifetime. Their sounds are more distinguishable during courting rituals and not correlated with death.

In [[Greek mythology]], the swan was a bird consecrated to [[Apollo]], and it was therefore considered a symbol of harmony and beauty and its limited capabilities as a singer were [[sublime (philosophy)|sublimated]] to those of [[songbird]]s.

[[Aesop]]'s fable of "[[The Swan and the Goose]]" incorporates the swan song legend as saving its life when it was caught by mistake instead of the goose but was recognized by its song.<ref>{{cite book|title=The Complete Fables|last=Aesop|publisher=Penguin Classics|year=1998|isbn=0-14-044649-4|url-access=registration|url=https://archive.org/details/completefables00aeso}}, [https:/page/books.google.com126/books?vidmode/2up |page=ISBN0140446494&id=ZB-rVxPvtPEC&pg=PA127 p.127]}}</ref> There is a subsequent reference in [[Aeschylus]]' ''[[Agamemnon (play)|Agamemnon]]'' (verses 1444–5) from 458 BCE. In that play, [[Clytemnestra]] compares the dead [[Cassandra]] to a swan who has "sung her last final lament". [[Plato]]'s ''[[Phaedo]]'' (84d) records [[Socrates]] saying that, although swans sing in early life, they do not do so as beautifully as before they die. Furthermore, [[Aristotle]] noted in his ''[[History of Animals]]'' (615b) that swans "are musical, and sing chiefly at the approach of death". By the third century BC the belief had become a proverb.<ref>{{cite journalweb |lastauthor=Arnott |first=W. GeoffreyAeschylus |title=Swan SongsAgamemnon |journalurl=Greece & Rome |volumehttp://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=24Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.01.0004%3Acard%3D1431 |numberpublisher=2Perseus |date=OctoberDigital 1977Library |pagesat=149–153Lines |doi=101444–5.1017/S0017383500018441 |jstoraccess-date=642700}}</ref><ref9 name="Brazil,September Mark2021 2003">{{cite book|titlearchive-date=The9 WhooperSeptember Swan|author=Brazil,2021 Mark|publisherarchive-url=T & A D Poyser|year=2003|isbn=978-0-7136-6570-3}} pphttps://web. 64–65archive. ([httpsorg/web/20210909205311/http://bookswww.googleperseus.comtufts.edu/hopper/bookstext?iddoc=bPerseus:text:1999.01.0004:card%3D1431 |url-E6dEYkcwsC&pgstatus=PA64live Online version])}}</ref>

The most familiar European swan, the [[mute swan]] (''Cygnus olor''), although not actually mute, is known neither for musicality nor to vocalize as it dies. This has led some to criticize swan song beliefs since antiquity, one of the earliest<ref name="Arnott, W. Geoffrey 2007">{{cite book|title=Birds in the Ancient World from A to Z|authorlast=Arnott, |first=W. Geoffrey|publisher=Routledge|year=2007|isbn=978-0-203-94662-6}} pp. |pages=182–184. ([|url=https://books.google.co.ukcom/books?id=b4pN4OApWw4C&pg=PA183&lpg=PA183&dq=arnott+whooper+swan&sourcepg=bl&otsPA183|access-date=pwU1WdFdhd&sig=JIw_h0GKRwwwxsM794hJVmiyfkc&hl=en&sa19 November 2021|archive-date=X&ei=Nq38UO3EMa22 September 2022|archive-W0QWG0IDoDA&vedurl=0CFAQ6AEwBg#vhttps://web.archive.org/web/20220922071753/https://books.google.com/books?id=onepageb4pN4OApWw4C&qdq=arnott%20whooper%20swan+whooper+swan&fpg=false Online version])PA183|url-status=live}}</ref> being [[Pliny the Elder]]: in CE 77, ''[[Pliny's Natural History|Natural History]]'' (book 10, chapter xxxii: ''olorum morte narratur flebilis cantus, falso, ut arbitror, aliquot experimentis''), states: "observation shows that the story that the dying swan sings is false." Peterson et al. note that ''Cygnus olor'' is "not mute but lacks bugling call, merely honking, grunting, and hissing on occasion."<ref>{{cite book|title=A Field Guide to the Birds of Britain and Europe|authorlast1=Peterson, Roger|first1=R. T. Tory|author2last2=GuyMountfort Mountfort|author3first2=P. A. DG. |last3=Hollum |author4first3=P. A. D. Hollom|year=2001|publisher=Houghton Mifflin Field Guides|isbn=0-618-16675-0}}, p. |page=49}}</ref>

However, the [[whooper swan]] (''Cygnus cygnus''), a winter visitor to parts of the eastern Mediterranean, does possesspossesses a 'bugling' call, and has been noted for issuing a drawn-out series of notes as its lungs collapse upon expiry, both being a consequence of an additional tracheal loop within its sternum. This was proposed by naturalist [[Peter Pallas]] as the basis for the legend. Both mute and whooper swans appear to be represented in ancient Greek and Egyptian art.<ref name="Brazil, Mark 2003"/><ref name="Arnott, W. Geoffrey 2007"/>

The whooper swan's nearest relatives, the [[trumpeter swan|trumpeter]] and [[tundra swan]]s, share its musical tracheal loop. Zoologist [[Daniel Giraud Elliot|D.G. Elliot]] reported in 1898 that a tundra swan he had shot and wounded in flight began a long glide down whilst issuing a series of "plaintive and musical" notes that "sounded at times like the soft running of the notes of an octave".<ref>{{cite news|access-date=21 January 2013|url=http://www.prairiefirenewspaper.com/2013/01/the-swans-of-nebraska|title=The Swans of Nebraska|work=Prairie Fire|location=USA|date=January 2013|author=Johnsgard, Paul A. |author-link=Paul Johnsgard |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20150402180913/http://www.prairiefirenewspaper.com/2013/01/the-swans-of-nebraska |archivedate=2 April 2015}}</ref>

==Post-classicalLater cultural references==

In [[William Shakespeare|Shakespeare]]'s ''[[The Merchant of Venice]]'', Portia exclaims "Let music sound while he doth make his choice; / Then, if he lose, he makes a swan-like end, / Fading in music."<ref>[http://www.opensourceshakespeare.org/views/plays/play_view.php?WorkID=merchantvenice#1405 ''The Merchant of Venice'', Act 3 Scene 2] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170807112853/http://www.opensourceshakespeare.org/views/plays/play_view.php?WorkID=merchantvenice#1405 |date=7 August 2017 }}. Hosted at Open Source Shakespeare.</ref> Similarly, in ''[[Othello]]'', the dying Emilia exclaims, "I will play the swan, / And die in music."<ref>[http://www.opensourceshakespeare.org/views/plays/play_view.php?WorkID=othello#3598 ''Othello'', Act 5 Scene 2] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170807113135/http://www.opensourceshakespeare.org/views/plays/play_view.php?WorkID=othello#3598 |date=7 August 2017 }}. Hosted at Open Source Shakespeare.</ref>

The well-knownA [[Orlandomadrigal Gibbons(music)|madrigal]] by [[madrigalOrlando (music)|madrigalGibbons]], "[[The Silver Swan (song)|The Silver Swan]]", states the legend thus: