The Ant & The Antlion
The Medieval Bestiary Project
Section 1 - Ants and Allegory
One bright day in late autumn a family of Ants were bustling about in the warm sunshine, drying out the grain they had stored up during the summer, when a starving Grasshopper, his fiddle under his arm, came up and humbly begged for a bite to eat.
"What!" cried the Ants in surprise, "haven't you stored anything away for the winter? What in the world were you doing all last summer?"
"I didn't have time to store up any food," whined the Grasshopper; "I was so busy making music that before I knew it the summer was gone."
The Ants shrugged their shoulders in disgust.
"Making music, were you?" they cried. "Very well; now dance!" And they turned their backs on the Grasshopper and went on with their work.
As this fable from Aesop shows, ants have been known as hard workers for thousands of years. In fact, the Book of Proverbs uses the ant as an example against the lazy:
“Go to the ant, O sluggard, and consider her ways, and learn wisdom; Which, although she hath no guide, nor master, nor captain, provideth her meat for herself in the summer, and gathered her food in the harvest. How long wilt thou sleep, O sluggard? When wilt thou rise out of thy sleep?”
St. Isidore of Seville describes ants in his Etymologies:
“The ant (formica) is so named because it ‘carries bits of grain’ (fert micas farris). It has great shrewdness, for it provides for the future and prepares during the summer what it consumes in the winter; during the harvest it selects the wheat and does not touch the barley. When it rains on the ant’s grain, the ant throws it out.”
The Aberdeen Bestiary identifies three characteristics of ants that were used as allegories for Christian education:
Ants move in an orderly fashion when looking for grains to store in their nest. They move in a single file line and do not beg for food from other ants in their colony. Instead, they follow the tracks of the ants who have already found food and bring it back to their nest.
The Aberdeen Bestiary states that men who act in unity as the ants do will be rewarded.
The Grand Medieval Bestiary compares ants to prudent folk and the 2nd Century work called the Physiologus, cites Christ’s parable of the Wise & Foolish Virgins. Ants are like the Wise Virgins, who brought enough oil in their lanterns to wait for the coming of the Bridegroom. There is even a parallel to Aesop’s fable where the Foolish Virgins beg for oil and the Wise Virgins reply: “Lest perhaps there be not enough for us and for you, go ye rather to them that sell, and buy for yourselves.” While the Foolish were away trying to get oil, the Bridegroom arrived and locked them out of the wedding feast.
When ants store grain in their nest, they divide their supply in two, in case rain or dampness causes the seed to germinate and the nest to be without food for the winter.
Bestiary writers use this characteristic to help their readers distinguish the letter of the law in the Old Testament and the spiritual fulfillment in the New.
The Aberdeen Bestiary states that, “In the same way, you, O man, should keep separate the words of the Old and the New Testament, that is, distinguish between the spiritual and the carnal, lest the law interpreted literally should kill you, for the law is a spiritual thing, as the Apostle says: 'For the letter killeth, but the spirit giveth life' (2 Corinthians, 3:6). For the Jews, who paid attention only to the letter of the law and scorned its spiritual interpretation, have died of hunger.”
When foraging, ants are able to distinguish wheat from barley, and only bring the wheat back to their nest.
Barley was considered food for the beasts and the ants were thought to avoid it. Job even says: “Barley grew for me instead of wheat.”
Bestiary writers used this as an example for Christians to avoid heresies and choose sound doctrine. The Aberdeen Bestiary writer says, “For heresy is like barley, and should be cast away, because it shatters and destroys men’s souls. Therefore, Christian, flee from all heretics, their teachings are false and hostile to the truth.”
Finally, ants were thought to be able to predict the weather. If rain made their food wet, they would open their nests and let it dry out in the sun. There is modern evidence that ant antennae can detect subtle changes in temperature and humidity, which could help them predict when it might rain. Instead of bringing their food out to dry, however, it is thought that they build up their nests to prevent water from getting in. There is even a proverb: “If ants their walls do frequent build, rain will from the clouds be spilled.”
Section 2 - Ethiopian Ants & Ant-Lions
After St. Isidore discusses ants, he also mentions the following:
“It is said that in Ethiopia there are ants in the shape of dogs, who dig up golden sand with their feet – they guard this sand lest anyone carry it off, and when they chase something they pursue it to death.”
These giant, Ethiopian ants, or Indian ants as they are often referred, have a long history in the bestiary tradition. The English botanist, George C. Druce, in his article, An Account of the Murmekoleon or Ant-Lion, provides a description of the giant ants and how to obtain their gold:
“The animal in question is there called the Ethiopian ant, but in classical writers usually passes under the name of Indian ant. The earliest source of information that we have is Herodotus (fifth century B.C.). According to him the scene is laid in a northern district of India, where there is a desert in which ants abound in size somewhat less than dogs but larger than foxes. They burrow underground and heap up the sand which contains gold. The Indians go to the desert to collect this sand, each man provided with three camels harnessed together side by side, that is on either side a male, and in the middle a female on which he rides. The female must only just have been parted from her recently-born young. The Indians being thus equipped set out at such a time that they will arrive at the hottest hour of the day, for during the greatest heat the ants hide underground. They bring with them sacks which they fill with the sand and then return as fast as they can. For the ants detect them by the smell and pursue them, so that if the Indians do not get a good start while the ants are assembling, not a man could be saved. The male camels in time slacken their pace, but the females mindful of their young hasten on; and in this way the Indians return safely with the gold.”
It is thought that the ants will eat the tired, male camels and buy enough time for the men to escape with the females laden with gold.
Pliny, in his Natural History, mentions that the horns of one of these giant ants are displayed in the temple of Hercules at Erythrae and their size as being miraculous. Pliny goes on to describe the ants as having the color of a cat and being as large as an Egyptian wolf.
The Ethiopian Ants are connected in the bestiary tradition to another creature, the Ant-Lion. Druce deduced that there were generally two strains of thought as to what ant-lions were for Medieval writers, an Eastern tradition and a Western one. Each tradition refers to a completely different creature though the names are the same.
We have already discussed the Eastern “Ethiopian Ant” and that came to be conflated with the ant-lion. The East believed that the ant-lion was a composite creature, with the front half of a lion and the back half of an ant. In fact, the Greek translation of Job 4:11, which is usually translated as, “the tiger (or old lion) perisheth for lack of prey,” can be translated as “the myrmecoleon (ant-lion) perisheth for lack of prey.” Druce states that its father, being a lion, ate flesh, and its mother, being an ant, ate grains. The ant-lion produced would possess two natures and would not be able to eat either meat or grains. Therefore, ant-lions were used as symbols for indecisive men.
The Western tradition since St. Gregory the Great has to do with an insect that eats ants and Medieval writers will primarily cite St. Isidore’s description of the ant-lion in his Etymologies:
“The ‘ant lion’ (formicoleon) is so called either because it is the lion (leo) of ants or, more likely, because it is equally an ant and a lion, for it is a small animal very dangerous to ants because it hides itself in the dust and kills the ants carrying grain. And thus it is called both an ‘ant’ and a ‘lion,’ because to the rest of the animals it is like an ant, but to ants it is like a lion.”
Druce goes on to say that some bestiary writers, such as the scholastic Bartholomaeus Anglicus or Bartholomew the Englishmen, thought the ant-lion to be a type of spider. “It is like an ant with a white head, and it has a black body, marked with white spots. And the bite of this creature is as painful as that of wasps. And it is called ant-lion because it hunts ants like a lion and sucks out the juices from their bodies, but it is devoured by sparrows and other birds just as an ant.”
In his Morals on The Book of Job, St. Gregory the Great uses the ant-lion as a symbol for Satan:
“Which same creature, as we have before shewn, hiding itself in the dust kills the ants carrying their corn, in that the Apostate Angel, being cast out of heaven upon the earth, in the very pathway of their practice besets the minds of the righteous, providing for themselves the provender of good works, and whilst he overcomes them by his snares, he as it were kills by surprise the ants carrying their grains. And he is rightly called ‘Ant-lion,’ i.e. ‘a lion and ant.’ For as we have said, to the ants he is ‘a lion,’ but to the birds of the air, ‘an ant,’ in that our old enemy, as he is strong to encounter those that yield to him, is weak against such as resist him. For if consent be yielded to his persuasions, like a lion he can never be sustained, but if resistance be offered, like an ant he is ground in the dust. Therefore to some he is ‘a lion,’ to others ‘an ant,’ in that carnal minds sustain his cruel assaults with difficulty, but spiritual minds trample upon his weakness with virtue's foot.”
St. Albert the Great may have been the first scholar to determine that this ant-lion was a type of insect, not a spider. The Grand Medieval Bestiary states that, citing St. Albert, the ant-lion is not an ant, but closer to the tick in body and has the habit of hiding in the sand. “It digs a hemispherical cavity and places its mouth at the center, then when an ant looking for food ventures nearby, captures and devours it.” This is a very accurate description of the ant-lion as we know it today. The ant-lions that trap and eat ants are actually in the larval stage of their lifecycle. Adult ant-lions have wings and eat nectar and pollen.
Section 3 - Ants as Medicine
Famous medieval abbess, and Doctor of the Church, St. Hildegard von Bingen, wrote about the medicinal uses of ants in her book, Physica:
“A person who has much phlegm in his head, chest or stomach should take an ant hill, with the ants inside, and cook it in water. He should pour that water over a hot stone and draw the steam into his nose and mouth, ten or fifteen times. The phlegm will diminish.
But one who has a superfluity of bad humors in him, that is gicht, should take an ant hill, with the ants, and cook it in water, preparing a bath. He should get into that bath, and keep his whole body in it, exposing only his head covered with a cloth moistened in that same water. If his head were to touch the water in the bath, it would be easily hurt by its strength. He should do this often, and the gicht will go from him.”
If someone has leprosy of any kind, he should take the earth where there is a hill of ants, so that it is possible to know how much the ants had dampened that earth. He should place it among the burning embers of beech wood and let it flare up from these embers, so the earth exceeds the quantity of embers. He should then let hot water pass through the hot earth nine times, as if making lye. Then he should mix goat tallow with a little more old pork fat and put it in the lye-water. After it congeals, it should be removed from the water. He should add powdered violet and chamomile, less chamomile than violet, to make an ointmen1t. He should anoint the area of the leprosy with the ointment, while he is near the fire, for nine months or more. He will be healed, if the leprosy is not the death of him, or unless God does not want him to be cured. When he is applying the ointment, he should take care not to get near another person or pig. The strong vapor of the leprosy, going out of him would infect them, and they would easily get leprosy from him.”
A person who has swellings and scrofula should smear ant eggs on a green oak leaf, spread rooster dung over that, and often place it over the swellings or scrofula, and they will disappear.”
But, if a person is angry, or mentally oppressed, or sad, he should take young ants, when they still adhere to their eggs, with a bit of the nest in which they lie, and tie them in a linen cloth. Afterward, when he senses the heaviness in his mind, he should loosen the cloth that holds the ants and place them on his heart until it receives their sweat. He will have a calm mind, will be happy, and will receive a good understanding of the matters with which he is occupied.”
Conclusion
To the Ancients and Medievals, ants and ant-lions were a source of moral edification and intellectual curiosity. Ants were used as models for hard work and industry, while ant-lions were thought to be symbols of the Devil. The Eastern tradition of the ant-lion retained the more legendary aspects of the monstrous Ethiopian Ants, while the Western writers began to figure out the lifecycle of the predatory insect, the ant-lion.
I will leave you with a story from Charle Martin’s translation of Ovid’s Metamorphosis that recounts how Zeus turned ants into warriors after his son, Aeacus, begged him for help.
“And stunned by such a whirlwind of disasters,
I cried, ‘O Jupiter, if what folks say
is not untrue, that you have lain in love
with Aegina, the daughter of Asopus,
and that you’re not ashamed to be our father,
either restore to me those who are mine,
or else give me a sepulcher as well!
Jove answered favorably with a flash
of lightening followed by a thunderbolt.
'I take this omen, and I pray that these
signs of your purpose augur well for us,’
I said, ‘for I accept them as your promise.’
It happened that there was an oak nearby,
one with unusually widespread branches;
this tree, whose seed had come from Dodona,
was therefore sacred to almighty Jove;
here we observed a swarm, in single file,
each bearing a great load in tiny jaws:
a busy company of grain-gathering ants,
making its way across the wrinkled bark!
Astonished by that multitude, I cried,
'O best of fathers, give me just as many
new subjects and fill up my lifeless city!'
That lofty oak tree trembled, and its limbs
groaned as they moved in the unmoving air;
I shook with terror and my hair stood up;
and even though I kissed the earth and oak,
could not admit — not even to myself —
the hopes I had. And yet, I hoped, indeed,
and in my heart I cherished my desires.
Night fell, and sleep claimed our bodies, worn
by ceaseless cares. Before my eyes I seemed
to see the oak that I had seen before,
with just as many branches and the same
number of creatures swarming over them,
and the limbs swaying as they had before:
the grain-bearing ants were shaken to the ground,
where they at once seemed to grow much larger,
lifting themselves from where they’d fallen off,
to stand with upright torsos; they put aside
their former leanness, monotonous black hue,
and many of their feet, while they assumed
a human form and human attributes.
Sleep fled: waking, I had no confidence
in what my vision had disclosed to me;
no help, I thought, from heaven.
But within,
a great hubbub arose; it seemed to me
I heard what I’d been long unused to hearing:
the sound of human voices!
While I still thought
myself asleep and dreaming, Telamon
came bursting in on me and cried out, 'Father,
come forth, and you will see a miracle
greater than you had hoped for or believed in!'
'I went on out, and there they were: the very
men that I had just seen in my dream —
now wide awake, I recognized the fellows!
Approaching, they saluted me as king.
I offered thanks to Jove and portioned out
my city and my fields, now tenantless,
to these new citizens. I called this folk
the Myrmidons
a name that doesn’t hide their origins.
You’ve seen their bodies; well, their character
and dispositions have remained the same:
they are a thrifty race, industrious,
acquisitive, and keep their acquisitions.
All similar in age and bravery,
these are the ones who’ll follow you to war
when the east wind, which so propitiously
brought you here, shall veer round to the south.”
All bestiary images obtained from https://bestiary.ca/index.html