The margins of the so-called "Falcon Book"
are like an aviary, teeming with pheasants and quail,
red-legged partridges and swallows, turtledoves and plovers, oyster
catchers and vultures. More than 500 representations of at least 80
different species of bird adorn one of the most famous medieval
manuscripts, and the author of this work is no less a personage than
Emperor Frederick II. According to the Arab chronicler Ibn al-Giawzi, the
Emperor was a bald-headed man, near-sighted and of reddish
complexion and, had he been a slave, would have been worth little. Yet, to
his admirers he was the "wonder of the world". Born in 1194 at Jesi near
Ancona, Frederick II was considered to be "the first modern ruler" by Jacob
Burckhardt. He spoke not only "vulgar Latin", the Italian vernacular, but
also mastered Latin, Greek, Hebrew, Arabic, French and a Provencal
dialect. His court was the Western centre of science and art during the
first half of the thirteenth century.
Frederick II was a patron of the arts, open to Judaic
and Islamic culture, and interested in astrology and medicine. Driven by
insatiable curiosity, he laid the ground work for Italian poetry,
introduced — and this was of great controversy — experiments on human
beings, and earned a reputation as a natural scientist. A great deal of
his knowledge in this last field is contained in his "Falcon Book". In it
he describes how falcons, eagles and hawks can be tamed and trained to
hunt game birds and small animals. He is just as well-informed on the prey
of his falcons. An inveterate polymath, the Emperor, in loving detail,
describes their appearance, anatomy, habits, flight patterns and defensive
strategies — so precisely that the "Falcon Book" is still used today as a
basic textbook in the field of ornithology. He was the first to present
evidence on the cuckoo bird's sneaky habit of laying its eggs in other
birds' nests.
For all the admiration he receives, Frederick II owed
his sole military defeat to his passion for science and hunting. On 18 February 1248,
the city of Parma went on the offensive against the Emperor's troops after
he had besieged the city for months. The offensive succeeded and part of
the imperial treasure was lost, including the original manuscript of the "Falcon Book". Frederick II was out
hunting with his birds of prey when the surprise attack was mounted.
Adding insult to injury, the biographer of Pope Gregory IX, who did not
care much for the Emperor, implied that the Emperor had degraded the title
of "His Imperial Highness" to that of a game-keeper.
