Hedgehogs

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When the Sega Corporation was looking for a new character to take the video-game world by storm, they chose a critter that has now become a household name: Sonic the Hedgehog. Why a hedgehog? Those involved in the creation of the character felt the hedgehog was a universally recognizable animal, one that transcended such distinctions as race and gender, and an animal without any entrenched cultural stereotypes or roles. The real hedgehog is indeed a distinctive animal—even without Sonic’s cobalt-blue color and Michael-Jackson shoes—and a closer look at the archaeological and historical record shows that it has played a role in folklore, mythology, and superstition for thousands of years.

Photo Credit: Courtesy Paramount Pictures and Sega of America.

Hedgehogs belong to the subfamily Erinaceinae; there are 17 species in five genera, and they are native to parts of Europe, Asia, and Africa. There have been no native New World hedgehogs since the Paleozoic Era. The generic name of the two European species, Erinaceus, refers to snakes, which form part of the hedgehog’s diet, along with worms, snails, frogs, berries, mushrooms, insects and roots; its habit of rooting in hedges for such food items accounts for its common name.

THE HEDGEHOG’S TRICK

In the seventh century BCE, the Greek poet Archilochus wrote, “The fox has many tricks, the hedgehog only one—but it is a very good one.” He was referring to the creature’s most distinctive feature: its spines. The hedgehog’s body is covered with 5,000 to 7,000 of these sharp, modified hairs, each equipped with an erector muscle. Their design and function is ingenious: they are filled with air, which allows them to bend and serve as shock absorbers. The hedgehog’s musculature allows it to ball up completely, tucking away its fragile legs and hiding its soft and vulnerable belly and face beneath its raised spines. This defense is so effective that it works against just about every enemy, aside from badgers, owls, and motor vehicles!

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THE HEDGEHOG THROUGH TIME

Egyptian Hedgehogs

Hedgehogs are relatively common in Egyptian art. They seem to be connected to the idea of rebirth, an association that arises from their practice of aestivation: desert hedgehogs descend underground in summer to avoid extreme heat (northern hedgehogs hibernate in winter); when they emerge weeks later they are “reborn” as if emerging from the underworld. For this reason, hedgehog figurines were often included in mummy wrappings. The hedgehog was also viewed as an apotropaic creature—that is, they warded off evil. Hedgehogs were believed to be immune to venom and other toxins, so wearing a hedgehog amulet could transfer the protection of the hedgehog to the human.

Hedgehog Amulet Egyptian. Middle Kingdom. The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

A Middle Kingdom rattle dating from between 2000 and 1700 BCE, shaped like a hedgehog, would have served a similar purpose—shaking it was meant to scare off malevolent spirits and dangerous animals.

Hedgehog Rattle. Egyptian. Middle Kingdom. Brooklyn Museum.

Near Eastern Hedgehogs

Hedgehogs appear in Near Eastern art from as early as the fourth millennium BCE. They are a common symbol on Old Babylonian cylinder seals.

Old Babylonian Cylinder Seal. The British Museum.

Hedgehog figurines were used as votive offerings. An exquisite example from the late second millennium bce was found near the temple of Inshushinak at Susa: a limestone hedgehog riding on a wheeled carriage. The hedgehog was found with several other examples of animals on carts, whose purpose is still unclear: were they votive offerings, toys, or a bit of both? Either way, the attention to detail on the carved hedgehog shows a familiarity with the animal; its inclusion, alongside other symbolically significant critters like lions, suggests it held some importance in the animal pantheon.

Hedgehog on wheels. Middle Elamite Period. Iran. Louvre.

Classical Hedgehogs

In the Greek and Roman world, hedgehogs were famously believed to predict the weather, and references to this practice appear in several Classical sources. This folkloric tradition most likely derives from the habit of hedgehogs to hibernate or aestivate in extreme weather.

Aryballos Hedgehog. 600 BCE. Greek. Staatliche Antikensammlungen.

Some modern hedgehog enthusiasts have tried to build a connection between this tradition and the modern North American “Groundhog Day,” speculating that, since there are no hedgehogs in the New World, and German settlers in Pennsylvania (where there are no groundhogs) presumably brought their fondness for hedgehogs with them, one subterranean hibernator was substituted for the other. Though the veracity of this claim is still hazy, recent years have seen the creation of a “Hedgehog Day” tradition nonetheless!

PRACTICAL USES

Although famously used as stubborn croquet balls in Alice in Wonderland, the most common use for hedgehogs was carding wool. Hedgehog skins were stretched over pieces of wood and used to comb out raw wool prior to spinning it. The skins could also be used to fluff up woolen garments and to remove tangles from wool cloth. There are also references to hedgehogs as a food source, particularly in the Roma tradition—apparently cooking them in clay was the easiest way to remove the spines. There are also several medicinal uses attached to the species. Ancient Egyptian and Classical sources suggest that wearing hedgehog amulets or rubbing a mixture of ground hedgehog spines or hedgehog oil onto your skin could cure baldness, and numerous aryballoi (oil flasks) in the shape of hedgehogs attest to the popularity of this remedy.

Faience Arybellos. Archaic. East Greek. The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

A 17th-century English medical text suggests that hedgehog feces could also cure baldness, while an 18th-century English folk text suggests that drinking a beverage mixed with roasted and powdered hedgehog skin could cure kidney stones.

THE HEDGEHOG TODAY

In the 20th and 21st centuries, hedgehogs carved out a place in popular culture, as exemplified by Beatrix Potter’s The Tale of Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle, the 1975 animated short film Hedgehog in the Fog, Mecki the hedgehog logo of a German magazine for 70 years, and of course, the aforementioned Sonic the Hedgehog. In the early 1990s, a pet hedgehog craze swept across North America with the importation of African Pygmy Hedgehogs (Atelerix albiventris). Today, hedgehogs are one of the most popular exotic pets around the globe, and stars on Instagram and social media. In 2013 the hedgehog became the national wildlife emblem of Britain, and in 2016 it was voted the UK’s favorite mammal—but the future of the species in the wild is tenuous. Numbers are plummeting at an alarming rate and the species is classified as vulnerable to extinction, largely on account of the dangers presented by vehicles, the use of pesticides like slug pellets, and the spread of fences, which act as barriers and often replace suburban hedges and rural hedgerows. People have begun to rally around this iconic animal, and conservation programs like “Hedgehog Street,” run by the British Hedgehog Preservation Society, are working hard to help save this endearing little critter. 

-Dr. Carolyn Willekes

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