the Week of Proper 28 / Ordinary 33
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Bible Dictionaries
Partridge
Watson's Biblical & Theological Dictionary
or קדא , 1 Samuel 26:20; Jeremiah 17:11; περδιξ , Sir_11:30 . In the first of these places David says, "The king of Israel is come out to hunt a partridge on the mountains;" and in the second, "The partridge sitteth," on eggs, "and produceth," or hatcheth, "not: so he that getteth riches, and not by right, shall leave them in the midst of his days, and at his end shall be contemptible." This passage does not necessarily imply that the partridge hatches the eggs of a stranger, but only that she often fails in her attempts to bring forth her young. To such disappointments she is greatly exposed from the position of her nest on the ground, where her eggs are often spoiled by the wet, or crushed by the foot. So he that broods over his ill-gotten gains will often find them unproductive; or, if he leaves them, as a bird occasionally driven from her nest, may be despoiled of their possession. As to the hunting of the partridge, which, Dr. Shaw observes, is the greater, or red-legged kind, the traveller says: "The Arabs have another, though a more laborious method of catching these birds; for, observing that they become languid and fatigued after they have been hastily put up twice or thrice, they immediately run in upon them, and knock them down with their zerwattys, or bludgeons as we should call them." Precisely in this manner Saul hunted David, coming hastily upon him, putting him up incessantly, in hopes that at length his strength and resources would fail, and he would become an easy prey to his pursuer. Forskal mentions a partridge whose name in Arabic is kurr; and Latham says, that, in the province of Andalusia in Spain, the name of the partridge is churr; both taken, no doubt, like the Hebrew, from its note.
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Watson, Richard. Entry for 'Partridge'. Richard Watson's Biblical & Theological Dictionary. https://www.studylight.org/dictionaries/eng/wtd/p/partridge.html. 1831-2.
