The ladybird: the insect of Our Lady and of farmers

Red, round and dotted with black, the ladybird is perhaps the only insect that hardly anyone brushes away in annoyance. In many European languages its name reveals a special relationship with the sacred and with good luck. When a ladybird lands on a hand or on clothing, a long popular tradition holds that it brings good fortune and that it is best left to fly away undisturbed, perhaps while making a wish as it departs.

A name dedicated to the Virgin

The Italian coccinella comes from the Latin coccinus, “scarlet”, itself linked to the name of the insect from which a prized red dye was obtained. In many other languages, however, the name recalls the Madonna. The English ladybird or ladybug contains Our Lady, the Virgin; the German Marienkäfer means “Mary's beetle”; the Spanish mariquita is a diminutive of María. In French it is called bête à bon Dieu, “the good Lord's little creature”.

A popular tradition, hard to date, explains these names by telling how medieval farmers, threatened by pests, prayed to the Virgin and saw ladybirds arrive to save the harvest. The seven spots of the commonest European species, Coccinella septempunctata, have been associated with the Seven Sorrows of Mary, while the red of its wing cases has been compared with the colour of her mantle in much sacred painting.

An ally in the fields

Behind the legend lies a concrete basis. Many species of ladybird, both as adults and as larvae, feed largely on aphids and other small insects that damage plants. Farmers noticed that where there were ladybirds the crops suffered less, and it was natural for the insect to be seen as a gift from heaven, sent to protect the fruits of their labour.

This usefulness also has a scientific history. In the late 1880s the citrus groves of California were being devastated by a scale insect that had arrived from Australia; the introduction, from Australia as well, of a small ladybird, Rodolia cardinalis, brought it under control within a few years. The episode is regarded as one of the first great successes of modern biological control and confirmed, with the tools of science, the farmers' age-old trust.

Rhymes and omens

Throughout Europe the ladybird appears in children's rhymes. In England an old one bids it fly away home because its house is on fire and its children are in danger; in other countries it is asked about the weather, marriage or the direction from which a sweetheart will come. Counting the spots to foretell years of happiness or the number of children is another widespread custom, always treated as a game rather than true divination.

The ladybird shows how a lucky charm can arise from everyday experience. The farmers' respect for a useful insect turned into devotion, then into nursery rhyme, and finally into decoration on cards, jewellery and children's clothes. In that little red dot crossing the meadows one can still read the ancient bond between work in the fields, popular faith and the hope of a good harvest.