Socrates, Plato tells us, heard the song of a swan on the day of his death. The Valkyries, in the guise of swans, bore their fallen heroes to the Valhalla of Norse mythology. Pythagoras believed ...

Goddess Saraswati’s vehicle is the swan, which is believed to possess a unique ability to separate the pure from the impure. For instance, the swan can drink milk from a mixture of milk and ...