Cock (3)
Cock
in Christian Art. Representations of this bird frequently occur on tombs, from the earliest period. When not associated with the figure of St. Peter, it appears to be a symbol of the resurrection, our Lord being supposed by the early Church to have broken from the grave at the early cock-crowing. A peculiar awe seems always to have attached to that hour, at which all wandering spirits have, through the Middle Ages, been supposed to vanish from the earth. Hamlet and the ancient ballad called The Wife of Usher's Well occur to us as salient examples of a universal superstition. Prudentius's hymn Add Galli Cantumn (Cathem. 1:16) adopts the idea of the cock-crowing as a call to the general judgment. See Aringhi, 2:328, 329 (in a complete list of animal symbols).
Fighting-cocks seem to symbolize the combat with secular or sensual temptations. The practice of training them for combat has probably always existed in the East, and certainly was in favor at Athens (comp. Aristoph. Av.; 1Co 9:27). See Bottari, 3:137.
Two cocks accompany the Good Shepherd in Bottari,plate 172 (from the tympanum of an arch in the cemetery of St. Agnes).
