The first cuckoo

20 April · Norfolk

Lore and belief

In Norfolk it was believed that whatever you were doing when you first heard the cuckoo in spring, you would be doing most often for the rest of the year. Another belief held that an unmarried person would stay single for as many years as the cuckoo called when first heard. Chambers adds that the cuckoo is the subject of the oldest English song to survive with its music, Sumer is icumen in.

It is a popular belief in Norfolk that whatever you are doing the first time you hear the cuckoo, that you will do most frequently all the year.

From Chambers's Book of Days, vol. 1, p. 530. Read the original

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