Peacocks
Peacock Beauty Secrets Revealed
Peacock Beauty Secrets Revealed
Discovery - October 10, 2003
A team of physicists has just determined the exact mechanism behind the luminescent beauty of the feathers in a peacock's tail. The discovery could help to explain how certain hummingbirds, ducks, pheasants, insects and even objects, such as opals, achieve their brilliant colors.
According to a report published in the current Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, color in nature occurs due to two basic processes: pigmentation and structural coloring. Pigment is a substance that, like a dye, gives color to living and inanimate objects. Peacocks and other structurally colored animals and things, such as rainbows, soap bubbles and the blue sky, instead get most of their color from light reflection. As a result, while human hair can look shiny clean, it can never achieve the brilliance and radiant coloration of a peacock's tail feather. "In human hair, color is due to pigment," explained Jian Zi, professor of physics in the Surface Physics Laboratory of Fudan University in Shanghai, China, and lead author of the PNAS paper. "If you change the view angle, color is not altered. In peacock feathers, color is produced by the reflection of light with frequencies within the partial photonic band gap. If you change the view angle, the partial photonic band gap will shift to short wavelengths for oblique incidence."
The photonic band gap refers to the crystalline structure of barbules that Jian Zi and his colleagues analyzed using an optical microscope and a scanning electron microscope. Each peacock tail feather possesses a central stem with an array of barbs on each side. Each barb, in turn, possesses an array of smaller, flat barbules.
The outer layer of the barbules consists of a two-dimensional crystal framework made of melanin rods connected by keratin — a fibrous protein — in a lattice pattern. The number and spacing of the rods controls how light reflects which produces different colors. For peacocks, the colors are green, golden yellow, brown and a very bright blue.
Male peacocks display their iridescent feathers for prospective female mates. Females may check out the feathers of a number of different males before deciding on a suitor. The length and quality of a male peacock's feathers can indicate his age, vigor, and status.
Zi and his team did not study the mechanism behind the classic "eye" print found within the feathers but they believe it is due to genetics.
"The formation of the eye pattern must be the result of evolution," Zi said. "The coordination of individual barbules in the formation of the eye pattern must be controlled by the instruction coded in genes."
Che Ting Chan, a physicist at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, agrees with the new findings. He told Discovery News that Zi and his team present "a very convincing" explanation. Chan added, "The research is very impressive because it establishes convincingly and quantitatively the mechanism of color production in peacock feathers, which is so subtle, and yet so precise and beautiful."
The Peacock Encyclopedia
Peacock or peafowl, large bird of the genus Pavo, in the pheasant family, native to E Asia. There are two main species, the common (Pavo cristatus), and the Javanese (P. musticus) peacocks, both found in deep forest where they travel in small flocks. A third type, the Congo peacock, was discovered recently in Africa. Unusual peacocks are the Argus pheasant, with eyelike spots on its secondary flight feathers, and the white peacock, thought to be a mutation of the common peafowl.
When the term peafowl is used, peacock then refers to the male of a species and peahen to the female. During courtship the crested male common peacock displays his elongated upper tail coverts - a magnificent green and gold erectile train adorned with blue-green eyes - before the duller-plumaged peahen. The peacock is well known as an ornamental bird, though it is quarrelsome and does not mix well with other domestic animals.
The peacock figures in the Bible and in Greek and Roman myth, where it appears as the favorite bird of the goddess Hera, or Juno, and the bird was known to the pharaohs of Egypt and to 14th-century Europe, where it was roasted and served in its own plumage. Peafowl fly well despite their size, and roost in trees at night. Peacocks are classified in the phylum Chordata, subphylum Vertebrata, class Aves, order Galliformes, family Phasianidae.
Name: The Peacock
Scientific Name: Pavo
Observed in: The Southern Hemisphere
Constituent nebulae, star clusters, fixed stars: Peacock (Alpha star)/NGC6752 (Globular cluster)
Observed in Japan: Almost impossible to view from Japan
Best season for observation: Fall (20:00 meridian:early September)
Description:
This constellation was named after the spectacularly plumaged peacock. It was first presented to us by German, Johann Bayer, in the beginning of the 17th century. The brightest second-magnitude star 'Peacock' forms the head of 'The Peacock'. Even in Okinawa and Amami Oshima, only a part of this constellation is visible, so you would best go south if you want to get a good look.
Seton's drawing of a peacock train is remarkable for its detail and elegant geometry. Seton began his celebrated career as an illustrator of wildlife, not as a writer.
White Peacock butterfly Anartia jatrophae on Plumbago Plumbago auriculata
White Peacocks
The crown of peacock's feathers leads to a further revelation: that it is the music of the heart which can be expressed through the head; it is the knowledge of the head and the love of the heart that together fully express the divine message. The peacock's feather in all ages has been considered as a sign of beauty and knowledge; beauty because it is beautiful, knowledge because it is in the form of an eye. It is by keen observation that man acquires knowledge. Knowledge without love is lifeless. So, with the flute, the crown of peacock's feathers makes the symbol complete.
In alchemical writings we meet a seemingly bewildering multiplicity of animal symbols - red lions, white eagles, stags, unicorns, winged dragons and snakes. Although at first glance all this complex mass of symbolism seems tortured and confused there is an inner coherence to these symbols, which the ancient alchemists used in specific ways reflecting their esoteric content. In this article I wish to consider a particularly tight knit group of these animal symbols, the birds of alchemy - the Black Crow, White Swan, Peacock, Pelican, and Phoenix - which are descriptive of certain stages of the alchemical process. Of course it would be wrong to suggest that there are fixed rigid meanings with regard to these symbols. The alchemists always integrated the symbols they used, so that one has to look at the total context, the background against which they stand, but when the birds appear in this sequence it is almost certain that the following interpretation can be applied.
Firstly, let us look at the symbols in general. What did the alchemists wish to symbolise by birds? The essential thing about birds is that they, having as their domain the air element, mediate between the earthly realm and the heaven world. The alchemist in observing the flight of birds, recognised in them a picture of the human soul undergoing spiritual development. The soul, aspiring upwards, flying free of the restraints of the earth bound body seeking the heavenly light, only to have to return to the earthly consciousness again after the meditation, the alchemist symbolised by the bird. Thus the bird symbols, in alchemy, reflect the inner experiences of soul alchemy, the soaring of the soul free from the earth bound body and the physical senses. The soul, in the meditations of soul alchemy, touches upon the spiritual world, and brings something of this back into the outer life again. The birds as symbols mediate between the physical and spiritua1 worlds, they reflect certain archetypal experiences encountered by the soul in its development through the alchemical process.
These symbols were used in two ways. Firstly, as a description in a text of one aspect of the process. Thus the alchemist might indicate a certain process as the Pelican stage, and describe certain facets of this by using perhaps other symbols, Secondly, these bird symbols could be used as a subject matter for a meditation, and by inwardly building such a symbol, one connected in soul with the essential experience of the particular stage of the alchemical-soul process.
Consider them in the following sequence, one which occurs in various sources: Black Crow - White Swan - Peacock - Pelican - Phoenix - as these correspond to a developing inner experience which involves a progressively deepening encounter with the inner spiritual dimension of our being.
The Black Crow sometimes also the Raven is the beginning of the great work of soul alchemy. This indicates the initial stages of the alchemist's encounter with his inner space, through withdrawing from the outer world of the senses in meditation, and entering what is initially the dark inner world of the soul. Thus this stage is also described in alchemical texts as the blackening, the nigredo experience, and it is often pictured as a death process, as in the caput mortuum, the deaths head, or as some alchemical illustrations show, the alchemist dying within a flask. Thus in the symbol of the Black Crow we have the stepping out in consciousness from the world of the physical senses the restrictions that bind us to the physical body.
The next stage, is often shown as The White Swan. Now the alchemist begins to experience the inner world as being light filled - the initial inner brightness which is often erroneously mistaken for true illumination. This is merely a first conscious encounter with the etheric world, and in comparison with physical sense experience is for many souls so overpowering as to be pictured as bright white light. The alchemical tradition recognised this and symbolised this stage as the White Swan. The swan is a bird which is rarely seen in flight, but rather swimming upon lake or river, gracefully moving on the surface of water- in soul terms, on the soul's surface, its etheric interface with the physical.
With the Peacock stage, the alchemist has entered into the inner experience of the astral world, which initially appears as ever shifting patterns of colour. This experience is often symbolised in alchemy by the appropriate image of the peacock's tail with its splendid iridescence of colour. In terms of this series of five stages, the turning point is reached with the Peacock. Up until this point the alchemist has experienced aspects of his being which he was formerly unconscious of - the etheric forces and the astral body. Essentially these experiences have happened to him, although he had to make himself open to the experiences through entering into the initial Black Crow state, however, in order to progress he must begin to work upon his inner being.
This active working with the soul forces is perfectly pictured in the Pelican. The Pelican is shown stabbing its breast with its beak and nourishing its young with its own blood. The alchemist must enter into a kind of sacrificial relationship with his inner being. He must nourish with his own soul forces, the developing spiritual embryo within. Anyone who has made true spiritual development will know well this experience. One's image of one's self must be changed, transformed, sacrificed to the developing spiritual self. This is almost invariably a deeply painful experience, which tests one's inner resources. Out of this will eventually emerge the spiritual self, transformed through the Pelican experience. The Pelican was in this spiritual sense a valid image of the Christ experience and was used as such by the early alchemists.
The Phoenix completes this process of soul development. The Phoenix bird builds its nest which at the same time is its funeral pyre, and then setting it alight cremates itself. But it arises anew from the ashes transformed. Here we have captured the alchemists experience of spiritualisation, He has integrated his being so much, that he is no longer dependent upon his physical body as a foundation for his being. He now stands upon the sureness of the spiritual - he has in this sense attained the Philosopher's Stone, the Spiritual core of his being. Thus we can sketch shortly the process of Soul alchemy, the integration, purification and transmutation of the soul, as pictured in this series of bird symbols.
BLACK CROW - withdrawal - freeing of the from depend ence on the Physical senses
PHOENIX - freeing of the spirit from the bounds of the physical
WHITE SWAN - experience of the etheric body
PELICAN - using consciously the forces of the etheric body
PEACOCK - astral body consciousness - inward immersion - point of transformation - outward expression integration - purification - transmutation
The Peacock's Tail is the central experience to this process, the point of inner transformation, which arises from a true consciousness of the astral body. We note also that the other stages mirror each other. Thus the Black Crow and the Phoenix are related as beginning and end of the process, but in a deeper sense they are both connected with death-processes. The dying to the senses of the Black Crow stage is ultimately transformed into the triumph over the death process of the physical, that is pictured by the Phoenix. There is a further mirroring of the White Swan and Pelican stages. The White Swan is an experience of the etheric forces in one's being, and this is later transformed into a conscious mastery and outward expression of these life forces.
The Peacock's Tail stage - the conscious experience of the astral body - stands alone in this picturing of the process, though it was sometimes split into two facets, in the writings of some alchemists - an initial winged dragon phase which resolved into the Peacock's Tail. In the initial encounter with the astral body, the negative distorted aspects of one's being can dominate, and these can be pictured as the winged dragon, but through soul purification, ultimately the full beauty and splendour of the astral body are revealed in the Peacock's Tail.
In the early alchemical texts (and in particular the 'Rosarium philosophorum'), this picture of soul alchemy is developed in parallel with descriptions of what was a sore physical process. Thus it was that the soul development of the alchemist went hand in hand with an actual physical operation, and this operation, the details of which have not been wholly lost, involved colour and form changes within a sealed flask, isomorphic to the inner changes of soul alchemy, described by these bird symbols. Thus we had a physical process which involved a blackening, a whitening; a rapid iridescence of colours, a circular distillation stage, and a final sublimation. Part of the task of modern alchemy must be to rediscover this physical process, and explore its further ramifications.
Peacock Feathers for Protection:
The peacock is considered to be a bird of protection and safe guarding. This bird is also valued as a protection for the psychic self. There has been lore that writes that to have a peacock feather within the home this helps to safe guard any of the energy in the environment. I personally have always had peacock feathers in my home, even when I was a child in my room. I also know that some native people also use the peacock feathers in fans and some crafting. While I have heard some individuals speak of not having them in the home but I can say that nothing has never come about for me. I found the feathers and consider them to be a gift from The Creator.
Peacock for Harmony
The peacock brings harmony and joy to our mind. This bird is majestic, proud with much expression and as the male bird walks and dances to the female in courting. This reminds us of the celebration in life.
NBC displays the peacock with its tail feathers full of All-Seeing Eyes. In Hinduism... 'when the god Indra transforms himself into an animal, he becomes a peacock. In India the peacock was believed to have a thousand eyes in its feathers... In Java, the peacock was associated with the Devil. In Mosul in northern Iraq, there is a sect of Yezidis who hold that the Devil is not evil, and call him the Peacock Angel.'
Myth has the peacock representing fidelity, as it dies of grief, or remains single, if it loses its mate.
Legend says it hates gold and will not go near it.
Peacock also is said to be able to foretell rain, and dances when rain is coming.
Finding a peacock feather - good luck, harmony, serenity, peace of mind, relaxation and protection are all associated with the magnificent peacock.
Babylon and Persia - Both had a peacock throne.
Egypt - It sometimes accompanies Isis.
Greece - The emblem of the bird-god Phaon. Associated with Hera, who is credited with scattering the "Argus Eyes" over its tail.
Hindu - The myth is that the peacock "has angels' feathers, a devil's voice, and the walk of a thief." It is the mount of Sarasvati, goddess of wisdom and learning. It is also, sometimes, a vehicle of Lakshmi and of Brahma. When it is mounted by Kama, god of love, it represents desire. Hindu gurus are fond of using peacock feathers in darshan to deliver shaktiput to their disciples.
China - Its feather is an attribute of the goddess Kwan-yin
Japan - Its feather is an attribute of the goddess Kwannon.
- About the Peacock
The Peacock in ...
The Lost Book of Nostradamus
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