WREN

25th January 2024

Photo Credit: SzymonBartosz (Getty Image), CANVA

QUOTATION

Good faith,

I tremble still with fear; but if there be

Yet left in heaven as small a drop of pity

As a wren’s eye, feared gods, a part of it!

IMOGEN: Cymbeline, Act 4, Scene 2

WREN (Troglodytes troglodytes)

The tiny, beautiful, tuneful Wren is one of Shakespeare’s favourite bird metaphors. Wrens appear in Cymbeline, Henry VI Part 2, King Lear, Macbeth, Merchant of Venice, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Pericles, Richard III, Twelfth Night and Two Noble Kinsmen. Wrens are symbolic of smallest, of outsized courage, musicality and are often used to signify turmoil in the natural order, e.g. ‘the world is grown so bad that wrens make prey where eagles dare not perch’ (RICHARD, Richard III, Act 1, Scene 3)

Wrens appear in literature, myth and decorative arts in many cultures. William Turner in his 1544 book on the principle birds noted in Aristotle and Pliny records Aristotle’s claim that the Wren is ‘called both senator and king, on which account the Aquila (Eagle), they say, fights with it’. Turner also records notes on English wrens of the 16th century including the shape and location of their nests and that ‘it also is a bird that roves alone, and never flies in flocks; nay more so often as it meets another of its kind it forthwith declares war, and fights’.

Wrens with their distinctive upright tails and melodius song are found throughout Britain and Europe. They nest in a wide variety of places including rocky areas from where they get their scientific name ‘Troglodytes’ or ‘cave dweller’. Wrens are still common although their numbers can decline in hard winters.

More Information

Birdlife Datazone: Northern Wren

British Trust for Ornithology (BTO): Wren

Folger Shakespeare Library: Search Shakespeare’s Works

RSPB: Wren

William Turner ,1544 A short and succinct history of the principle birds noticed in Aristotle and Pliny. (Accessed via Archive.org)