Why is the humming-bird hawk-moth so called ?
Because of the markings of its back being superstitiously associated with the head of a skeleton, with the limb-bones crossed beneath In German-Poland,this moth is called the death’s-head phantom, the wandering- death-bird, etc. Its cry, produced by scratching its mandible against its horny chest, there becomes the voice of anguish, the moaning of a child, the signal of grief; it is regarded as the device of evil spirits, and the very shining of its eyes is thought to represent the fiery element whence it is supposed to have proceeded. Flying into the apartments of weak persons, in the evening, it at times extinguishes the light, foretelling war, pestilence, hunger, death – to man and beast.
