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The Medieval Church · c. 1132–1152
The Aviary
De Avibus
Hugh of Fouilloy · c. 1100–c. 1172
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What it is
Birds read as figures of the spiritual life — the dove, the hawk, the pelican wounding itself to feed its young — written for lay brothers who could not read easily.
Why it lasted
One of the most copied and most heavily illustrated didactic works of the Middle Ages, designed so the pictures carried the teaching.
Where to read it
Public domain and free to read in full, though not held here. The archives below have it.
These open a search on each archive rather than a direct link, which is the honest way to point at an edition nobody here has checked line by line.
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