The Pharmaceutical Journal
Vol 274 No 7347 p528
30 April 2005

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Memory depicted as a two-faced Janus more
The cuckoo and the chiffchaff: distinctly different harbingers of spring more
Why Latin should be regarded as an important discipline for learning more

Memory depicted as a two-faced Janus

Janus, to the ancient Romans, was the god of doors and gates, and depicted as a double-headed person looking both ways. For the ancient Greeks, the mother of the muses was Mnemosyne, meaning memory. The two have a curious interconnection.

In an essay in Nature for 31 March, by Yadin Dudai, a neurobiologist, and Mary Carruthers, a teacher of English, history and religious studies, the nature of memory is explored in some detail. They point out that modern research regards memory as a trace of past experience, but that this is an oversimplification. Mental excursions can be made not only into the past but into the future and the faculty of recollection presents only half the picture. Aristotle, Galen and the Arabian philosophers made much of memory as concerned in the ethical virtue of prudence, which is the ability to make wise judgements and effective plans of conduct. Creative thinking is as much a part of memory as is recollection of past deeds. In medieval thought, data from the senses came into the brain and cumulatively made phantasy, causing either benign or hurtful emotions. Cogitations or thoughts were organised by memory, which kept them available for future use.

It must be asked whether memory considered as solely an imprint of the past is a valid concept, and remembered that past experience creates a capacity for preparing for the future. Experiences bring changes in many levels of brain activity. Memories are consolidated into stable neurological and emotional items. There must be some doubt about minor episodic memories — whether they consolidate or not. Sometimes we wish we were able to extinguish them utterly. Verily, memory is a two-faced Janus, and it is a pity that much of its operation remains outside our control.

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The cuckoo and the chiffchaff: distinctly different harbingers of spring

There is an ancient saying that the cuckoo is the “harbinger of spring”. Acccording to the dictionary definition, a harbinger is a forerunner or someone who announces the approach of someone else. We take it to mean that the cuckoo marks the arrival of spring in advance of any other creature. This, as Gilbert White the naturalist commented in 1780, is misleading. We may first come across a cuckoo at some time between the end of March and the middle of April, and there is great variation in the date when the bird decides to make its presence known.

In contrast, we may expect to hear the chiffchaff at least a couple of weeks in advance of the cuckoo. The two birds have a resemblance in that they both have a two-tone call, although their calls cannot be confused. Lord Grey of Fallodon in 1927 commented that the first hearing of the chiffchaff marked the beginning of the progress of a new year as it flitted among tall trees, preferably beech, uttering its onomatopoeic call.

The cuckoo has a mass of folklore behind it, in contrast with the humble chiffchaff. When you hear its call for the first time, it is said to be fortunate if it is from your right and unfortunate if it is from your left. At that time you should turn over any money in your pocket, and if there is none there you may expect ill-fortune. The number of the bird’s calls foretells the number of years your life will endure. If the frequency of calls is high, look out for rain in the near future.

Pliny wrote in the first century AD that when you hear the cuckoo for the first time you should gather up soil on which your right foot rests, since it will help you to discourage fleas.

In Shropshire collieries there was a custom when the first cuckoo was heard of claiming a holiday and having a drinking session. In other places there was a tradition that building a wall round a perched cuckoo and preventing its egress would prolong summer weather. It may be that this gave rise to the practice of calling someone a cuckoo because they were thought stupid.

The variation in pitch of cuckoo calls throughout the season is obvious. This has complicated their representation in musical orchestral scores. Arne, Bach, Beethoven, Delius, Mahler, Leopold Mozart, Rameau, Respighi and Saint-Saens are among composers who used the cuckoo call.

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Why Latin should be regarded as an important discipline for learning

It has recently been reported in the press that a £4.5m Government scheme to promote the study of Latin in schools may come to nothing. The computer software package was to have offered 1,000 activities and help non-specialists to teach the language but it still does not work after three years of development. Without prompt correction of the situation, many children will be denied the opportunity to learn Latin — a subject that only 600 schools, 100 of them state schools, now offer to their students.

Those who have never studied Latin may fail to see why it should be regarded as an important discipline for learning. Latin has provided education regarding grammar and syntax, leaving English literature as an enticing matter devoid of the burden of these language problems. Moreover, a background of Latin greatly assists and speeds up the learning of other European languages.

The classical languages, and Latin in particular, dispose their students to clarity of thought and give an insight into etymology. This in turn enables a student to appreciate the meanings and purposes of the words we use in everyday affairs and to warn him against the mumbo-jumbo with which we are assailed by politicians and others who have public affairs in their hands. Whatever the special discipline in which someone works, from law to medicine and other applied sciences, the need for precision and clear understanding of statements is paramount, otherwise no progress is possible in relation to a course of action.

It is high time we abandoned the notion that education is not to improve the mind but to fit us for some narrow, predesigned role in the workplace. Without responsible education people will be robots, induced to advance the narrow interests of those with power. The study of languages, and especially Latin and Greek, is the key to a rich culture which we should be permitted to enjoy.

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