Meaning & Analysis
In agricultural terms, the owner of a bull that impregnates a cow is responsible for, and legally entitled to, the resulting calf. It establishes a clear principle of ownership and liability in animal breeding.
Insights
Paternal Responsibility
The proverb is a direct allegory for human relationships, asserting that a man who fathers a child ('the calf') with a woman ('the cow') is socially, morally, and financially responsible for that child's upbringing.
Accountability for Actions
It illustrates the universal principle that one must accept the direct and foreseeable consequences of one's actions. The act of 'bulling the cow' cannot be separated from the duty of 'keeping the calf'.
Rejection of Irresponsibility
It functions as a social and moral condemnation of abandoning one's obligations, particularly in the context of sexual relationships and their outcomes, reinforcing community standards of conduct.
English Common Law
As noted by James Howell in 1659, this proverb was not merely a folk saying but a principle with authority in English Common Law, used to assign legal responsibility for illegitimate children.
Social Order and Paternity
In a pre-modern context lacking scientific paternity tests, such proverbs provided a crucial social and legal framework for ensuring children were supported, thus maintaining social stability.
Psychological Confrontation
The proverb's blunt, rustic phrasing serves to confront the psychological temptation to separate a pleasurable act from its long-term, burdensome consequences, enforcing a reality principle.
Literary and Legal Application
Shakespeare's use of the proverb in 'King John' to discuss the parentage of Philip the Bastard highlights its direct application to contentious issues of legitimacy, inheritance, and identity in human affairs.
Rhetorical Devices
Animal Allegory
Uses the simple, rustic imagery of farm animals (bull, cow, calf) to allegorically represent complex human issues of sex, paternity, and responsibility, making the rule both memorable and universally understood.
Imperative Mood
The word 'must' gives the proverb the force of an undeniable law or command, leaving no room for negotiation and emphasizing the absolute nature of the obligation.
Alliteration and Consonance
The repetition of the hard 'c' sound in 'cow' and 'calf' creates a strong, rhythmic quality that enhances its memorability and declarative force.
Transcription
Quotations
Said they The Calf must with the Cow.
Then if I have the Cow I must have the Calf too.
And to muse who should father my first childe, wer to doubt when the cowe is mine, who should owe the calfe.
Let him that got the calfe keepe the cow.
If my bull leap your cow, is not the calf yours?
Yours is the Cow, and you shall keepe the calfe.
'Tis fit, if Iustice bee not quite exil'd That he that wedds the mother, keepe the child.
In our Common Law there are some Proverbs that carry a kind of authority with them, as that which began in Henry the Fourth's time, He that bulls the cow must keep the calf.
(He that buyes).
I had the reputation of it [begetting a bastard] indeed and should have had the cow with the calf.
Shakespeare Citations
In sooth, good friend, your father might have kept This calf, bred from his cow, from all the world.
Cross References
Related Proverbs
Original Scan
Used under CC BY-NC 3.0.