The term cuckoo clock (and yes, this is the “official” way to spell it in English) comes from the cuckoo bird or Kuckuck in German. The cuckoo bird pops out from behind the door on each full hour and announces the time by the number of calls. If he calls 3 times, you know it is 3 o’clock. At 4 o’clock, he will cuckoo 4 times and so on. On the half hour he will cuckoo only once, regardless of what time it is.
The cuckoo is a medium-sized bird. It comes in many species which can be found all over the world. The cuckoo has to put up with a bad rap – it is accused of laying its eggs in the nests of other species and have them do the hard work. For some cuckoo species that is indeed true, but the majority of cuckoos do raise their own young.
In Europe, the cuckoo is associated with spring, in India the cuckoos are sacred to Kamadeva, the god of longing, whereas in Japan the cuckoo symbolizes unrequited love. In Greek mythology, god Zeus transformed himself into a cuckoo for goddess Hera, to whom the cuckoo was sacred. Last, but not least, Sonny the Cuckoo Bird has been the mascot for a certain cereal since the 1960s
Credited to:https://germanclocksandgifts.com/
