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- Feb 2024
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bestiary.ca bestiary.ca
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Pliny the Elder [1st century CE] (Natural History, Book 10, 66): Pelicans have a resemblance to swans, and would be thought not to differ from them at all were it not that they have a kind of second stomach in their actual throats. Into this the insatiable creature stows everything, so that its rapacity is marvelous. Afterwards when it has done plundering it gradually returns the things from this pouch into its mouth and passes them into the true stomach like a ruminant animal. These birds come to us from the extreme north of Gaul. - [Rackham translation]
In his Natural History (Book 10, 66), Pliny the Elder indicates that pelicans resemble swans, but have a second stomach in their throats into which they insatiably and rapaciously stow everything only later passing them into their true stomachs like ruminant animals.
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