page_title: Cormorant
section_title: In folklore, literature, and art
hierarchical_section_title: Cormorant / In human culture / In folklore, literature, and art
caption_attribution_description: English: Yūhi_Cormorants_catching_Fish_A_hanging_scroll_Color_on_silk_Middle_Edo_period_dated_1755_The_Tokugawa_Art_Museum 日本語: 熊斐　鸕鷀捉魚図　絹本着色　宝暦5年（1755）徳川美術館　
context_page_description: Phalacrocoracidae is a family of approximately 40 species of aquatic birds commonly known as cormorants and shags. Several different classifications of the family have been proposed recently and the number of genera is disputed. The great cormorant and the common shag are the only two species of the family commonly encountered on the British Isles and "cormorant" and "shag" appellations have been later assigned to different species in the family somewhat haphazardly.
  Cormorants and shags are medium-to-large birds, with body weight in the range of 0.35–5 kilograms and wing span of 45–100 centimetres. The majority of species have dark feathers. The bill is long, thin and hooked. Their feet have webbing between all four toes. All species are fish-eaters, catching the prey by diving from the surface. They are excellent divers, and under water they propel themselves with their feet with help from their wings; some cormorant species have been found to dive as deep as 45 metres. They have relatively short wings due to their need for economical movement underwater, and consequently have the highest flight costs of any flying bird.
context_section_description: Cormorants feature in heraldry and medieval ornamentation, usually in their "wing-drying" pose, which was seen as representing the Christian cross, and symbolizing nobility and sacrifice. For John Milton in Paradise Lost, the cormorant symbolizes greed: perched atop the Tree of Life, Satan took the form of a cormorant as he spied on Adam and Eve during his first intrusion into Eden.
  In some Scandinavian areas, they are considered good omen; in particular, in Norwegian tradition spirits of those lost at sea come to visit their loved ones disguised as cormorants. For example, the Norwegian municipalities of Røst, Loppa and Skjervøy have cormorants in their coat of arms. The symbolic liver bird of Liverpool is commonly thought to be a cross between an eagle and a cormorant.
  In Homer's epic poem The Odyssey, Odysseus (Ulysses) is saved by a compassionate sea nymph who takes the form of a cormorant. 
  In 1853, a woman wearing a dress made of cormorant feathers was found on San Nicolas Island, off the southern coast of California. She had sewn the feather dress together using whale sinews. She is known as the Lone Woman of San Nicolas and was later baptised "Juana Maria" (her original name is lost). The woman had lived alone on the island for 18 years before being rescued. When removed from San Nicolas, she brought with her a green cormorant dress she made; this dress is reported to have been removed to the Vatican.
  The bird has inspired numerous writers, including Amy Clampitt, who wrote a poem called "The Cormorant in its Element". The species she described may have been the pelagic cormorant, which is the only species in the temperate U.S. with the "slim head ... vermilion-strapped" and "big black feet" that she mentions.
  A cormorant representing Blanche Ingram appears in the first of the fictional paintings by Jane in Charlotte Brontë's novel Jane Eyre.
  A cormorant is humorously mentioned as having had linseed oil rubbed into it by a wayward pupil during the "Growth and Learning" segment of the 1983 Monty Python movie Monty Python's The Meaning of Life.
  The cormorant served as the hood ornament for the Packard automobile brand.
  Cormorants (and books about them written by a fictional ornithologist) are a recurring fascination of the protagonist in Jesse Ball's 2018 novel Census.
  The Pokémon Cramorant, featured in the 8th generation of the video game series may take its name and design from a cormorant.
  The cormorant was chosen as the emblem for the Ministry of Defence Joint Services Command and Staff College at Shrivenham. A bird famed for flight, sea fishing and land nesting was felt to be particularly appropriate for a college that unified leadership training and development for the Army, Navy and Royal Air Force.
caption: Cormorants catching Fish. Hanging silk scroll by Yūhi, Middle Edo period, Japan, 1755
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