The language of falconry

Falconry has developed an extensive lexicon, and many of its expressions have been adopted into everyday speech. A ‘fed up’ hawk is one that has filled its crop with food and has no interest in flying. A hawk that might want to fly from the glove is restrained by keeping its jesses firmly ‘under the thumb’ and ‘wrapped around the little finger’. It may be prevented from flying from a perch by a leash, putting it at the ‘end of its tether’. The falconer might keep the bird calm by covering its eyes with a hood, ‘hoodwinking’ it. A ‘callow’ is a nestling that is just beginning to grow feathers.A ‘haggard’ is a mature bird, caught in the wild, usually at the end of migration when it may be tired and underweight. A ‘cadger’ was an elderly falconer who would carry the ‘cadge’, a wooden perch, in return for tips. To ‘cadge’ a lift, to ‘caddy’ a golf bag, or to be an old ‘codger’ can all be traced to this origin. A drinking bird is ‘bowsing’, which gave rise to ‘boozing’. A bird protecting its prey will ‘mantle’, covering it with outstretched wings, hence the word ‘mantelpiece’ that covers a fireplace.