Editing Common blackbird (section)

==In popular culture==
[[File:SingSong6dcaldecott.jpg|thumb|"[[Sing a Song of Sixpence|Sing a Song for Sixpence]]" cover illustration]]
[[File:Chickenpie1.JPG|thumb|250px|right|A pie with a traditional [[pie bird]] in the shape of a blackbird]]

The common blackbird was seen as a sacred though destructive bird in Classical Greek folklore, and was said to die if it consumed [[pomegranate]]s.<ref name = "Cooper92">{{cite book |last=Cooper |first=J.C. |title=Symbolic and Mythological Animals |page=38 |year=1992 |publisher= Aquarian Press |location=London |isbn=1-85538-118-4}}</ref> Like many other small birds, it has in the past been trapped in rural areas at its night roosts as an easily available addition to the diet,<ref name=Cocker/> and in medieval times the practice of placing live birds under a pie crust just before serving may have been the origin of the familiar [[nursery rhyme]]:<ref name= Cocker >{{cite book | last = Cocker | first = Mark |author2=Mabey, Richard |title = Birds Britannica | year = 2005 |location=London | publisher = Chatto & Windus | isbn = 0-7011-6907-9|pages=349–353}}</ref>
<blockquote>
[[Sing a song of sixpence]],<br />
A pocket full of rye;<br />
Four and twenty blackbirds baked in a pie!<br />
When the pie was opened the birds began to sing,<br />
Oh, wasn't that a dainty dish to set before the king?<ref name = pie>{{cite book |last=Opie |first=I. and P. |title=The Oxford Dictionary of Nursery Rhymes |year=1997 |edition=2nd |pages=[https://archive.org/details/oxforddictionary0000opie/page/394 394–5] |publisher=Oxford University Press |location=Oxford |isbn=0-19-869111-4 |url=https://archive.org/details/oxforddictionary0000opie/page/394}}</ref></blockquote>

The common blackbird's melodious, distinctive song is mentioned in the poem ''Adlestrop'' by [[Edward Thomas (poet)|Edward Thomas]];
<blockquote>And for that minute a blackbird sang<br />
Close by, and round him, mistier, <br />
Farther and farther, all the birds <br />
Of Oxfordshire and Gloucestershire.<ref name = adelstrop>{{cite web|title= ''Adlestrop'' |url= http://www.poetsgraves.co.uk/Classic%20Poems/Thomas%20E/adlestrop.htm
|publisher= Poets' Graves |access-date=7 December 2007}}</ref></blockquote>

In the English [[Christmas carol]] "[[The Twelve Days of Christmas (song)|The Twelve Days of Christmas]]", the line commonly sung today as "four calling birds" is believed to have originally been written in the 18th century as "four colly birds", an [[archaism]] meaning "black as coal" that was a popular English nickname for the common blackbird.<ref>{{cite web|title= Birds of the Twelve Days of Christmas |url= http://10000birds.com/birds-of-the-twelve-days-of-christmas.htm |publisher= 10,000 Birds|access-date=19 December 2013}}</ref>

The common blackbird, unlike many black creatures, is not normally seen as a symbol of bad luck,<ref name=Cocker/> but [[R. S. Thomas]] wrote that there is "a suggestion of dark Places about it",<ref name = rst>{{cite web|title= ''A Blackbird Singing'' |date= 13 January 2003 |url= http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/a-blackbird-singing/ |publisher= Poemhunter |access-date=7 December 2007}}</ref> and it symbolised resignation in the 17th century [[tragedy|tragic]] play ''[[The Duchess of Malfi]]'';<ref name="deVries76">{{cite book |last=de Vries |first=Ad |title=Dictionary of Symbols and Imagery |year=1976 |page=[https://archive.org/details/dictionaryofsymb0000vrie/page/51 51] |publisher=North-Holland Publishing Company |location=Amsterdam |isbn=0-7204-8021-3 |url=https://archive.org/details/dictionaryofsymb0000vrie/page/51 }}</ref> an alternate connotation is vigilance, the bird's clear cry warning of danger.<ref name="deVries76"/>

The common blackbird is the [[List of national birds|national bird]] of Sweden,{{cn|date=October 2024}} which has a breeding population of 1–2 million pairs,<ref name=BWP/> and was featured on a 30&nbsp;[[öre]] Christmas postage stamp in 1970;<ref name = stamp>{{cite web|title= Bird stamps from Sweden |work= Theme Birds on Stamps |url= http://www.birdtheme.org/country/sweden.html |publisher= Kjell Scharning |access-date=13 December 2007}}</ref> it has also featured on a number of other stamps issued by European and Asian countries, including a 1966 4d British stamp and a 1998 Irish 30p stamp.<ref>{{cite web|title= 218 Thrushes Turdidae |work= Theme Birds on Stamps |url= http://www.birdtheme.org/scripts/family.php?famnum=218 |publisher= Kjell Scharning |access-date=8 June 2015}}</ref> This bird—arguably—also gives rise to the [[Serbian language|Serbian]] name for [[Autonomous Province of Kosovo and Metohija|Kosovo]] (and Metohija), which is the possessive adjectival form of Serbian {{Lang|sr|kos}} ("blackbird") as in [[Kosovo Polje]] ("Blackbird Field").<ref name= kosovo>{{cite book | last = Trbovich | first = Ana S.| title = A Legal Geography of Yugoslavia's Disintegration | year = 2008| location = Oxford | publisher =Oxford University Press | isbn =978-0-19-533343-5 |page = 76 }}</ref>

French composer [[Olivier Messiaen]] transcribed the songs of male blackbirds; these melodies have commonly appeared throughout his œuvre. The most notable instance of this is the 1952 chamber miniature [[Le Merle noir|''Le merle noir'']], a piece for flute and piano.

A common blackbird can be heard singing on [[the Beatles]] song "[[Blackbird (Beatles song)|Blackbird]]" as a symbol of the [[civil rights movement]].<ref>{{cite magazine|url=https://www.rollingstone.com/music/lists/100-greatest-beatles-songs-20110919/blackbird-19691231|title=Blackbird|magazine=Rolling Stone|date=10 April 2020 }}</ref>