Crows and Corvids in Early Medieval England

Had a rook as a teenager that had fallen out of a nest & I took home.
Extremely intelligent bird and very devoted - I used to take the bus to school about 4 miles away and he(?) would often follow it and land on my shoulder as I got off.
Wasn't allowed in school of course, but was always waiting for me when I got home. Eventually after several years , he gradually returned to the wild and I hope he had a good life. Fifty years later, still miss him, they're amazing birds.

This is only my humble opinion, but I do hope that you read this Simon. I believe that with videos like these you have found your RUclips ‘niche’. Combining your interest in linguistics with your knowledge of archaeology is very original. Your use of both to try to understand and present the medieval understanding and view of the material world is quite refreshing and not something I have see presented in so accessible and concise a format.

I learned to make Crow Calls as a Child. They really enjoy hollering back and forth with People.
I don't have a clue what any of it means but it's a lot of fun for all.
Ravens here are usually Solitary, Crows hang out in Flocks. Crows have followed me trying to keep the game going.
Crows know how to have Fun. Ravens are grumpy.

The modern German word for the Eurasian Jay is "Eichelhäher", literally "acorn jay". I note both the explicit link to acorns and the apparent similarity of "häher" and "higera".

I was walking down the street. A magpie was trying to eat a corn on the cob left on the pavement. Two pigeons were circling him and challenging him. The magpie retreated two meters. So I came over and moved the pigeons off. The magpie looked at me. I kicked the corn over to the magpie. He looked at me. We shared a moment and then he took off with the corn.
That is my story.

I remember an old story, I don't remember the source. An old woman was feeding ravens when a young man chastised her. Ravens eat the flesh of fallen warriors! They pluck the eyes of young men. The old woman turned to him and asked Who killed these young men? My Ravens were just cleaning up your sins.

In my experience as someone who has rescued and rehabilitated crows, rooks, jackdaws, jays and magpies, they all have a wide range of sounds. Most people don't get close enough to hear any but the loudest calls of course. Rooks in particular have a large vocabulary and talk in long conversations. They count to six, that being the number of forward facing toes! Also, the Cornish language word for jackdaw is chogha (gh is pronounced as the ch in loch), which is one of the main sounds they make. The other commonly heard sound is 'chow' so might relate to ceo?

I can add some anecdotal insight, Carrion Crows in the UK do indeed make a wide variety of vocalisations. I've spent a few years building trust with a large group in my local woods, and I'm constantly hearing new noises from them . My favourite is a soft little "Kyuff" that an individual will make, usually when sat in a tree alone and after having eaten. There's also a "doik, doik, doik" noise like pebbles being dropped into water which I love. The more varied sounds are much quieter than their common raucous calls, I've only really learned them since my "murder" got comfortable with me and started coming very close and being relaxed around me. I had always thought of crows as quite solitary until I got to know this group - there's usually about 8-10 of them waiting for me, but in the depths of winter I've been met by 30+, all waiting for peanuts!

1:42
I’m from Denmark and i destinctly recognise crawe as krage, hræfn as ravn and hroc as råge.
Damn it’s interesting to see all of the various influences in early English, the whole language really was a stew, with a bit of everything in it.

As someone who loves zoology, history, folklore and linguistics this is amazing! Please more! Maybe British birds of prey next?

interestingly the german word for corvid is "Rabenvogel" which means raven-like bird, and the carrion crow is referred to as "Rabenkrähe" (raven-crow) due to how similar it is to the raven, so clearly the raven being the catch all term for "big black bird" has precedent in other Germanic languages, which gives validity to the hypothesis that "hraefn" was used similarly in old english.

The Swedish word for jackdaw is kaja, as in Norwegian, and it was kaia in old Swedish. Likely onomatopoetic. We don't have any carrion crows where I live, but they can be seen further west. Same with rooks. Ravens love our landfills here. Interesting to note about blackbirds. The Swedish word is koltrast (coal thrush).

RUclips recommends many things to me. This is the first time it's ever recommended something I actually wanted to watch.

This was a cool video! As an american wildlife biologist I was surprised to hear that your crows are quiet, ours are always calling to each other! I was also intrigued that jackdaws make such large groups--that's something that our crows do as well, at least in wintertime.

I love this video, don’t know how I haven’t seen it before. One of my favorite little research rabbitholes I’ve had has been going down the origin of the magpie number poem, one I often see now attributed to crows and ravens. I had seen a post on tumblr shifting the attribution in that way and wanted to chime in with more info, but when I went to double check my facts, I found a bit of a mystery on my hands! You may know the common start, “One for sorrow/sadness, two for joy/mirth.” Finding what the first published version was has actually been quite tricky, as a lot of resources that seem to get a “source” correct then go on to quote a different version than appears in that publication, not to mention various reprints and addendums that seem to alter it. Not a lot of people reblogged my response, and I’m not even sure if they’ve read it, but it was fun going on that little journey.
I love learning about history of birds, especially in relation to language and folklore.

An anecdote about crows: I was once watching some crows struggling to tear apart some wrapper that had food in it. Further down the street were some gulls, who hadn't noticed it yet. Two of the crows started bombing the gulls, which led to them chasing the crows and so spotting the food. The gulls teared open the wrapper, and the crows, being faster, managed to get plenty of the food before the gulls ate it all- so being the first time I'd ever seen crows literally use another species as a tool!

"Crows and Corvids in Early Medieval England". What a title. What a topic. Love it!

For the Magpie, when in safe or comfortable surroundings, they make a range of lots noises, the laughing sound in my experience is used as warning call to either alert other magpies to a hazard (such as a cat) or to let other magpies know they're there. I used to have magpies living in the trees outside my window so heard their range of friendly chrips.

I'm immensely grateful for the rare confluence of my passions you've explored in this video; I hope others find these birds and the language surrounding them just as charming and intriguing

I got to meet a tame raven some years ago, and I was struck by how large he was. I said hello to him, and he looked at me as if he understood. They're very, very interesting animals.
His name was Edgar :)

The references to specific occurrences in poetry make this especially valuable - it helps tie readers in with the literary history.

I think this is my favorite RUclips video ever. I'm involved in two bird surveys currently, and and have a longstanding interest in British history, archaeology, and language. Even though I live in Oregon, I find learning about the landscape and history of Britain very compelling. You've got a new subscriber.

Great video, Simon.
Ravens can definitely identify individual humans, even when dealing with individual humans wearing the same clothes (plumage?). I work on the ski lifts in the french alps, a friend of mine has a raven that comes to his lift every morning to see him. It will take food from his hand, but when it's his day off, it will circle around, decide it's not the right person, and go away. I replaced him on his days off for a couple of seasons, and it would eventually come and pick up food left for it, but remained extremely wary of me, normally coming and picking stuff up the instant my back was turned :) It's a very chatty bird, and makes all sorts of odd noises, including imitating the lift's startup siren (which is sort of crowish honk, so go figure).

One fun fact is that Danish do actually have this similarity you mentioned between jays and magpies since they are called "husskade" (house-skade = magpie) and "skovskade" (forest-skade = jay). "Skati" in Old Norse was a tall lean person, later it came to mean a treetop (especially if the tree had lost its top branches) and thus the two birds with the long tails were called "skade". This pointy meaning of "skade" didn't survive in Modern Danish, but can be found in some Swedish dialects, my etym book tells me.

My local Australian magpies make many stunning sounds. I feel so lucky to have met the Tower of London ravens- majestic birds.

Fascinating work! I'm a Danish speaker and I perfectly understood the Saxon and Middle English words for "crow" and "raven" since these are, unsurprisingly, highly related to their modern Danish counterparts of "krage" and "ravn".

I'm a corvid enthusiast who loves history, folklore, and learning about language. I loved this video whole heartedly. I will be checking out your channel more because this is cool as heck

as someone with a keen interest in linguistics and birds this video is a dream crossover for me. really charming and well put together, thanks simon!

Makes me think of the storyline in 'Detectorists' when the magpies were taking the Saxon gold up to their nest!

A Simon roper video about birds, and there I was thinking the perfect video didn’t exist. Amazing mate keep it up ❤

I find it interesting that the image of Ravens amongst the Anglosaxons does not seem to be very negative at first, and became more negative overtime. In Alaska and the Pacific NW, ravens are very common and have a very important religious significance that is _generally_ positive; I found it funny the dichotomy; reading stories in school where the Raven is the ominous symbol of death (Like, OK, get to the point Poe) and then a storyteller comes in and tells a story where Raven is suddenly the hero. From my fuzzy recollection (I'm not Native) it seems what the Natives really got from Ravens is their intelligence and somewhat kleptomaniac personality, as Raven is usually portrayed as a trickster god, and often plays some role in the creation of the World/Man. They also can play a psychopomp role, and in general fill the same cultural niche that Coyotes do in the American Southwest.
We also have crows, though I can never keep the two straight and it seems everyone just calls them both "Ravens" anyway - I'm not sure if the Native languages grouped the two together or not. Magpies and Blue-Jays are also very common: Magpies are more social and obnoxious, whereas Jays are more reserved and don't group together as much, similar to in Britain it seems although the Jays are a different species. Spotted-Woodpeckers are also fairly common, although they're quite shy and solitary, very beautiful.

In Russian raven and crow is the same word, but the funny part of it is that raven is masculine - ворон, while crow is feminine - ворона. Children of course assume that the crow is a female raven. 😊
The Slavic root of the word is apparently shared with Finno-Ugric languages: warnis, vares, varis etc. I wonder if there is a connection to any Germanic names of Corvidae.
P.S. Both birds have negative connotation. Raven is a messenger of death. Crow is a scatterbrain, gawk.

The rooks where I live (North Yorkshire) have a call like the recording you played, but they also occasionally will perch up high and "sing", making all kinds of sounds including mimicing other bird calls, and indeed non-bird sounds (I'm pretty sure I've heard a dog's bark and a car alarm!). Very similar to how starlings work mimicry into their songs, although the rooks seem to have a more limited range - many of the sounds come out somewhat raspy, and the impressions are rarely as convincing as a Starling. The starlings that sit on my roof have actually made me think that there's a buzzard or a curlew or an oystercatcher etc flying over (I'm sure they laugh at me when I look up) whereas on hearing a rook do the same I would know it was a rook.

I love that you’re interested in birds. I always look forward to seeing them in your videos. 🌟🕊️

🙏 bless the yt algorithm for putting this video on my page

Around here in the California bay area where I live, American Crows are one of the most common birds, or at least one of the most visible, and I see them just about every day. They're fascinating to watch, and I often wonder what life is like from the perspective of a crow.
What you said at around 24:48 in the video about variety in the vocalizations of different populations of the same crow species made me think, if a species of crow has different regional "dialects", does their language change over time just as ours does? Would the call of a crow from England 1000 years ago sound just as foreign to a modern English-born crow as an Old English - speaker would sound to us? The study of human linguistics and etymology is already such a fascinating endeavor; just imagine what it would be like to be able to likewise trace the histories of corvid calls with a similar level of detail!

This was a delightfully enlightening video. As an American, it’s interesting hearing slight vocal differences the corvids in Britain have compared to the US. It’s also interesting how different species’ vocalizations share slight similarities. Especially upon hearing the recording for rooks, which sounds very close to blue jays.

On many levels this video was perfect for me. Hraefn is my Anglo-Saxon name, and for many years I had a pet raven named Crawa who could speak many words, and flew to my hand like a hawk. I love every corvid. I saw jackdaws and choughs nesting and roosting in many castles. I saw ravens in remote parts of Scotland, for instance, at the Faery Glen on Skye. Thanks for this, I really enjoyed it!

This video was just recommended to me by the youtube algorithm, and was a wonderful watch, Corvids have always fascinated me, and this look into how they would have been viewed historically is wonderful

A dive into linguistic development, early English history and my favourite subset of birds hahaha you have made me very happy

I never knew that the rook is called "a rook" in English. This is very interesting because in Polish we have the word "kruk" which if you say out loud can sound very close to "rook" (or even hroc tbh) but here it means "a raven". Meanwhile a crow is "wrona" (read: vronah) and a rook is "gawron" (read: gahvron).

I love jays! :) I live in northern Poland and over there I also see them only once or twice a year. I am from northern Italy, though (Venetian countryside), and there they are very common. When it comes to Italian the connection between jays and acorns is evident in the very name we have for them: "ghiandaia" (from "ghianda" - acorn). I am by no means a historical linguistics expert as you are, but I just googled the etymology of "ghiandaia" and according to google it comes from the late latin (2nd half of the 13th century) "glandarĭa" (birds that eats acorns). Great video! :)

That was very interesting. You have a great mix of knowledge that you appropriately qualify and this draws the viewer in deeper to ask questions as you question yourself. Great job.

Please do other animal-centric ones! The presentation style and subject matter are tremendously interesting.

If Beowulf is referencing Odin's Ravens (rather than literal ravens), as depicted flying straight from Odin's/ Odinic dancers heads, then he is describing a mental state where present Thought (Huginn) finds peace with Memory (Muninn). It's possibly coincidental that injuries to one or other brain hemisphere cause loss of one or other Raven, but unlikely.
Michelangelo also appears to have understood how 'handedness' corresponds with brain hemispheres: his God, giving life to Adam, speaks from 'between the Cherubim',
as the Germanic All Father speaks from between the Ravens.

I love linguistics, history and birds. This is making me genuinely happy. I love the caveats and great analysis. Amazing!!!!

more of the crows vs greggs bag please, i need to see the the full unboxing

As a linguist and lover of crows, Bravo!

At some times of year in Bucharest there are insane multi-species super flocks made of Hooded Crows, Rooks and Jackdaws at dusk. Standing on my balcony it would sometimes take 10-15 minutes for a stream of them 50-80 metres wide to fly past, it must have been tens of thousands of individuals at least. Never seen that in the UK.

in Dutch most people will use the term kraai (crow) for both crows, rooks, jackdaws, and ravens, especially if the difference isn't immediately apparent to the observer.
A lot of people probably don't even know the difference (especially city dwellers, who tend to only ever encounter jackdaws, but call them crows (rather than kauw, the Dutch word for jackdaw, which in English would be pronounced like "caw", about the vocalisation of the species).
Sometimes even starlings get confused with crows, simply because of their general shape and colour, when watched from a distance by people unfamiliar with the differences between the species.
Sometimes even male blackbirds get confused as crows, though most people will recognise them easily by their bright yellow beak.
Crows DO have a relatively wide range of vocalisations, and can learn new vocalisations as well. Blackbirds are the same.

In sweden there's a lot of folklore regarding the Siberian Jay. It is called nötskrika or koxik (sami goeksege) in northern sweden. It was seen as bringing good or bad luck depending on the situation. Mostly bad luck from what I've heard

Magpies seem to use their, what I call, "rattling" sound whenever they're communicating about some kind of threat (cat; sparrowhawk - although when it's one of those _all_ birds go nuts with calls), and perhaps also to warn the threat itself. A shorter couple of clicks or even squeaks is more usual when they're socialising. Anecdotally, based on a group that used to be local to where I live, anyway.
I once had to come out of my house to look at three of them with incredulity (which I believe they understood) after they'd been scuffling noisily - and annoyingly - on my roof for half an hour. Not much threat-rattling. More so the clicks if anything. Play-fighting maybe. It may have been my imagination, but they did seem to look sorry. They left after I went back inside.
Crows I've heard apparently playing "telephone" with a chain of them passing a message from one individual some distance away to another as far or further in the other direction. No idea of the true purpose. Watching a car on the road roughly parallel to their call-chain maybe? Tracking an aerial predator or foe?

I've thoroughly enjoyed this video and I would love this to turn into a series!

Brilliant video. New here to this channel, but saw the video title and was drawn in by curiosity and the wide spread general interest in Corvids.
Regarding your point 08:30 about seeing wild ravens, I’ll never forget when I climbed Ben Nevis early hours, in a foggy mist and at the top 1/3rd it being deadly quiet and baron - seriously felt other worldly - and the only occasional sound which broke this incredible silence, were these ravens. A few of them, just gliding about occasionally. Brilliant animals. And it was truly a strange and ethereal experience.
Thanks again for a great video! As others have said, combining these two expertise makes for fascinating content I’ve yet to see elsewhere that is done to this degree of professionals and that’s also entertainingly. Thank you for making this niche and insightful knowledge available to us all.

It always makes me smile how you constantly remind us you are not an expert - while at the same time sounding like an expert - at least to my ears!

this was beautiful and i love everything about it, super glad i found it and feel like ive learned a little more! thanks, man!

Thank you for including a brief cameo of one of my favourite British Columbia birds, Clark's Nutcracker (which I was taught to call Clark's Crow by my father). Very entertaining birds to watch with peculiar behaviours!

Fascinating video. I can tell a lot of work went into this. Great job.
I used to work at a place where I drove out of the car park and parked in the same lay-by to eat lunch every day. One day, a crow cautiously approached my open car window. It had half of its top beak missing. I threw it a nut, and it laid its head on the floor sideways to pick up the nut.
There began my relationship with 'brokebeak'. It was waiting for me every day, same place, same time, 5 days a week for a year. I always had nuts for lunch and threw some for it. I moved jobs after a year and always wonder what happened to brokebeak.

This was a great video. Thoroughly enjoyed it. The part on how "hraefn" could apply to both groups of Corvids as well as a specific type in a contextual manner was really well explained. When I was a child I would "caw" at the crows who were on my way to school and without fail they usually replied back. Very enigmatic creatures. Definitely would like more animal-focused videos.

i love bird noises and human noises this was great

I love ravens. Growing up in Alaska we have the identical northern raven species as you have in the UK. We do not have the American Crow. When I moved further south in the US, I had to get used to the American Crow, which I find to have much less character than the Raven. When I do see ravens occasionally now (usually requires leaving the city), I can recognize them instantly--even if I don't have good visual reference for their size, their wing motion makes them instantly distinguishable from crows. And hearing their voice is always a treat.

Apropos very little, I remember seeing ravens for the first time many, many years ago close to the summit of Helvellyn. It was a real privilege watching them flying and diving and hearing their calls. I remember being struck by just how much bigger than the crows and rooks I see at home they were! Brilliant memory and not hard to see how our Norse forebears (at least!) regarded them with such a numinous air. Of course, I've only ever seen them in the Lake District and it's interesting to note that they are associated with Owain ap Urien Rheged in the Welsh Breuddwyd Rhonabwy - the Lakes being Owain's old stomping ground and all.
I could swear I also saw jackdaws for the first time in that neck of the woods. They must've followed us home as they're a common sight here in Lancashire nowadays. Maybe I just hadn't registered seeing them beforehand, I don't know.
With regards to choughs, like you I've never had the honour of clapping eyes on one. I'm also pretty sure that Alpine choughs (Pyrrhocorax graculus) - which have yellow beaks as opposed to red - have been known to put in an appearance on this scepter'd isle from time to time.
Finally, I'd just like to express my thanks to you for making these videos. They are educational and well-produced. Some really good nuggets of information across the channel. And some great nature footage to boot! Keep it up!

We have a few Western Jackdaws over here. I live in a village close to Utrecht, about 20 minuts by bike, 5 by train.
They often beg for food by just sitting opposite someone who's eating, with somewhat of an expecting look.
Once, found one very close to my left foot. If I hadn't seen it, I might have trodden on it but then it would have skipped away of course.
It tried to reach some crumbs that had fallen in front of my feet but it didn't dare come any closer. It was very close already as I mentioned.
So I took a few steps back and that gave the bird the confidence to come forward and pick up the bread crumbs.

I see ravens daily here in Northampton. Low land pasture and sheep farming predominates. Love your videos!

Having watched one of your videos I couldnt explain a single thing I've learned 5 minutes later, but I feel ever so peaceful. Thanks.

I live in Canada not the UK, I don't much like crows and ravens etc. and am only vaguely interested in medieval history but I watched the whole video and really enjoyed it! And I subscribed!! Thanks for this video!!

This is marvelous! I love birds. I've drawn hundreds of crows, magpies, hoddies, and ravens. Please do more--it's really important to hear the roots of these words. I'm coming from the Gaelic side, which is very different, as you know.

In my neck of the woods (north western Switzerland) Ravens seem to be making a comeback. I can often hear their vocalisations. Such beautiful voices.

Such an interesting video, I live in Cornwall and have seen choughs several times on the coast, from my experience they make a very distinctive "cheow" call.

RUclips has been recommending me this this video for weeks, after giving in and watching I'm happy I did, this video was well worth watching.

I like how you put c. 2023 as if your unsure what year you are speaking in. Pehaps you are timeless.

Fun fact. Right about now is the nesting season for many corvids. Rooks will be nesting in colonies on treetops, you might notice oval egg shells littering the forest ground. You might also notice jackdaws, the second smallest corvid, nesting in tree hollows or in roof spaces. Magpies, the smallest, are less sociable and prefer nesting in secluded areas in an open nest made from twigs. Ravens nest on cliffsides, mountains and quarries. Other crows nest high up on trees and buildings. If you're lucky you might see corvids gathering twigs from trees or pulling the hair from livestock for their nests.

Some random notes: among the Norse ravens were very special and very distinct from crows (crows in Northern Europe are actually mostly gray), I wouldn't be surprised if it was similar among Anglo-Saxons even if they are less easy to tell apart from crows in Britain. Ravens have always been more rarely seen, but more talked about as an omen etc.

Why the heck am I watching this? Also why am I mesmerised by it?
When I was a young boy in the early 70s I lived near a rookery, one year whilst walking under the trees I found a fallen chick, I took it home and raised it on chicken mash and liver. I called him/her Timmy, what an absolute amazingly intelligent bird he/she was.
When I walked to school (3 miles away) this bird would follow me to school landing on roof tops, when I came out of school it would be waiting for me and the follow me home.
These bird are ultra intelligent, I’ve watched carrion crows playing on electricity wires, hanging upside down with wings splayed. I love Corvid’s. Great informative video.

Let me echo all other positive comments, first of all. 🎉
I love the entire ‘investigation’ shot at the end. As someone living in the rural and mountainous high desert of the western US, getting to watch the behavior but also the wet streetscape and hear the sounds helped me feel like I’m traveling again. Thank you for that in particular.

I've had this video recommended to me for weeks and I finally decided to watch it and I love this combination of topics. Truly a refreshing watch from what I'm usually suggested. I love corvids but I have a special love for Jackdaws ever since I saw a group of them encourage one to steal a french fry and their reaction was similar to a group of teens landing a perfect bottle flip.

You are so unbelievably nerdy, Simon. And that's a compliment.

Hey, thanks so much for making this video. My partner's surname is Cawood ("Ca" rhymes with "hay") and his dad has told me before that it , specifically that 'Ca' part, supposedly relates to jackdaws or another corvid. It was difficult to make that connection myself, but in comparison to 'ceo' I'm beginning to see how it could be true. So informative and interesting!

Your bird footage is beautiful. I like your bird thoughts.

In Canada I have never heard the Crow do anything but Caw!! Usually three times per set. The Raven is the one that makes all the croaking and clicking sounds. Having said that, my wife told me her brother had a "pet" crow that could say a few words. My daughter Holly also claims it was a crow that followed her calling to her by name. Every time I've tried to start up a conversation with a crow or even a raven for that matter they seem shocked and embarrassed that I would dare talk to them.

I’ve seen chuffs in a little colony in northern Cornwall! There was a cow pasture on the headland too. Lovely birds

Saw plenty of ravens when I walked Southwest Coast path, so they are doing well in Dorset, Devon, and Cornwall.

Fascinating account of corvids through history, yes please to more animal based videos.

0:33 I'm not convinced all humans have that

Really enjoyed this video. Thanks again, Simon. More animal ones, please!

23:30 - I live near a duck pond and there are a large number of Jackdaws that frequent the pond. Whether that's just because people often leave food for the ducks or because Jackdaws are simply attracted to ponds or lakes, I can't be sure.

Using this video as sleeping ASMR, your voice is calming!

I was talking to Jacky the Jackdaw this afternoon ,he lives on my chimney. I called him down for some Peanuts ,which I put on the shed roof. I can get direct eye contact and get within 10ft of him whilst talking to him. A bit later on the Jay turned up to get some peanuts, I saw a Raven in the tree this morning and the Magpies that live in the hedge came across. I saw the Woodpecker Yesterday, I sometimes see the red,white and black one also,Crows ,Buzzards and Sparrowhawks. I get harassed by the Bluetits whilst doing the washing up,they come and stare at Me until they get their Peanuts!

I've been blessed to spot choughs on Gower and Ceredigion here in Wales just last year.

Great video sir.
Carrion crows do have a limitless vocabulary of sounds. They click, gurgle, buzz and make glottal stops etc...in fact they can mimic. I knew one that made a sound like a water tap with a drip.
I tended to a murder of 200+ crows for over a decade. I noticed that the greater the sense of self importance was, the more unique/distinct the communication was, making it possible to identify individuals without even laying eyes on them.
It is a fallacy that all they do is 'Caw'.
The distinction between crows and Ravens is that Ravens seem to take a more profound pleasure in playing with their vocal range, and will rotate a greater variety of sounds on purpose. Its less to to with the need to communicate specifics, but even crows will talk for their own amusement.
Magpies do not only 'chatter' their calls are very complex and the only way i can describe it is somewhere between loading a 1980s tape cassette computer game and the sounds R2D2 makes.
Rooks can also be identified by their calls. They are distinct from Crows insofar as the quality of their voices is cruder. Simply put, Rooks sound like crows with laryngitis.

Super cool talk about jays in groups. Never seen them like that, but where I live rooks often fly around in similar large groups in the autumn. Also magpies group up in trees in spring and "shout" together and in Sweden we call it "magpie parliament" (skatriksdag) 😅

Absolutely one of the best videos I have seen on youtube in years.

I have an idea for higera (based on my knowledge of both Swedish and English).
Woodpecker in Swedish is "hackspett". With the "hack-" being the same word as the English "hack" and "-spett" in English would be "skewer". More interesting is the Swedish word for "stab" which is "hugga". The two words "hacka" and "hugga" in Swedish is obviously related words and describe similar things. Heron in Swedish is "häger", if one ever seen a heron hunt they kind of stabs in a thrust down through the surface of shallow waters, so in Swedish the word for heron "häger" and to stab "hugga" is very similar.
I think jays ("nötskrika" in Swedish which translates into "nut" and "screech/scream") are easily mistaken for woodpeckers and that is the basis for confusion, however what this entire video illustrates is how people have very loose understanding and words get mixed up and interpreted differently and many words can be variations of the same origin. I do not think "higera" refers to the magpie ("skata" in Swedish).
A fun extra fact is the word "hägring" in Swedish which means "mirage", this could be a reference to the how water reflects light and distorts the vision and also seem related to the heron and its hunting strategy.

Ravens are not an uncommon presence around the Cotswold escarpment. Their 'cronk' (I like to think of it as their casual, 'small talk' vocalisation) is unmistakable.
If they have a mate, the pair will never stray too far from one another which seems very civilised. They elope to the wild, high places and protect each other with fierce loyalty for the rest of their days.

That's where we get the word rookery! Thank you, Simon! I didn't know that!
I have just barely come to confidence in being able to tell crows and ravens apart, and I had no idea what a rook (the bird) was!

When I was in Iceland I was surprised to see ravens everywhere, even in the towns. They have the most amazing musical calls. Here in Australia, our ravens are more crow-sized, have scary pale eyes and make a very annoying long whingey call.

Modern German seems to make the connection of jays and oaks it seems because they're called "Eichelhäher". Plus that second part "häher" sounds a lot like how you pronounce "higera"...

This was great! I love corvids and I'm very interested in Saxon bird lore.

Here in the northwestern U.S., the crows whose territories fall on either side of a significant lake have different ‘dialects’. (One that routinely forages nearby is recognizable as soon as they open their beak, for being out of place.) What’s wild is that outside of nesting season, both groups commute to the same massive rookery north of the lake, yet their call repertoires don’t homogenize.
So: it’s entirely plausible to me that the typical UK carrion crow vocalization has changed over time, though I couldn’t tell you whether or not that would be from one dialect-group dying out because its ‘speakers’ did.

I live on Caldey Island, Wales and there are Choughs here. I'd never seen them before, I believe they are quite rare these days.