Dissertation on Birds of Prey and the Sport - the Falconry Heritage ...

E la madre questo vedendo vuole morire a dolore.. .e duolsi il cuore della madre
con maggiore angoscia che gli squarciati figliuoli, el cuore della madre e fesso da
uno mortale dolore pih che fusse da una tagliente spada.
The hawk gets what's coming to him when he ends his life by being caught in bird-lime.
The author concludes, "il malvagio che piglia i piccolini si duole quando k preso con
ingiegno." The moral interpretation is as follows:
Per lo sparviere s'intende gli malvagi uomini li quali, con tutto che il servigio de'
piccolini sia lor0 grazioso, non considerano il continovo utile e diletto, ma come
golosi e giotti solo in una ora gli dimagrono e consumano che mai non si possono
rilevare.
There is an obvious class conflict here: the greed of the powerful causes them to abuse
the lower classes that serve them. Here there is no gracious courtly courtesy towards
those less fortunate.
In these and other tales,6 the sparrowhawk and the kite represent the upper
classes, but their significance has changed. True, the kite has always been viewed
negatively, but here it represents a person who is truly evil. The sparrowhawk has none
of the positive gentle noble connotations, nor does it represent love of any kind, as is so
common. Here the birds represent powerful people as cruel tyrants, ready to victimize
the classes at which the stories are aimed.
In the novelle, falcons and hawks define the upper class in a more favorable way,
but even here, the symbolism gains some ambivalence as to who is an appropriate owner
of one, and as to what happens to a lover's falcon when he takes the rules of love too
literally. The stories in the Novellino, however, take place in an idealized past, and have
no ambivalence about what hawks signify and to whom they should belong.
Ibid., XIX and LXII.