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

These crows and vultures, disagreeable birds, while at once serving to evoke the color of
hell's inhabitants-black, the usual color of devils found in most medieval paintings of
hell-also trigger comparison between themselves, appropriate to hell in their
unpleasantness, and the pleasant hunting hawks enjoyed in life that the poet remarks on
earlier. These hawks are mentioned in the same breath as other accoutrements of luxury
that the well-heeled ungodly will also miss such as ermine and fine fabric^.'^
Later, Uguccione condemns those who lack charity towards the unfortunate,
preferring to revel in the trappings of their material wealth. Included in his list of the joys
of the medieval hedonist are of course hawks and falcons:
Mo me besogna dir de quig malaguradhi
q'ili no vol veder quig q'e desasi'adhi,
nisun pover de Deu n'avogol ne sidhradhi,
mai grassi palafreni e destrier segornadhi,
de belle vestimente spesso esser mudhadhi,
aostor ao sparaveri vol, e falcon mudhadhilo
The list carries on with armor, weapons of war, hounds, palaces, and such-the usual,
one might say. The flying of hawks and falcons is one aspect among many of the
pleasures typical of the wealthy, and is included by Uguccione wherever he condemns
obsession with worldly goods in his Libro. He condemns exactly the same pleasures of
life that Folgore will celebrate more than a century later. Quite beside the fact that these
are different genres of poetry, this contrast is evidence of the.growing acceptance of
worldly happiness as a valid goal as the Renaissance approaches.
39 Uguccione returns to his portrayal of hell again, leaving out the hawks but including many of nobility's
favorite pastimes:
La no se trovara bela cavalcadhura,
destrier ni palafren cum soaf ambladura,
ne norbia vestimenta, nC rica flibadhura,
palaslo ni tor, ni negun' armadhura. (158-161)
40 Vv. 357-362.