England’s Early Modern Peacocks

This article examines the introduction and proliferation of peafowl (Pavo cristatus) in England in the 16th and 17th centuries, a subject that scholars have given little attention to. Peacocks are an invasive species in the United Kingdom today and significantly associated with modern India and the British Raj. However, before peacocks were a modern invasive species, humans had already introduced them to the British Isles and commodified them. Peacocks were status symbols and financially lucrative products; the English also contextualized them in terms of human sin and xenophobia. This article analyzes peafowl in early modern English culture while also reconstructing the lives of these birds and their relationships with the humans who commercialized them and judged them as proxies for their own fears.