How did owls become known for being very wise?

Question

Owls are portrayed in ads etc.as being scholarly/smart.How did it get started?

Answer 1

Owls  fly without  producing sound & catch prey easily even at night. It is not captured by hunters  easily because it is nocturnal. Owl 's eyes are big and can see  at night. Brain is bigger in comparing body.

Answer 2

Athena, the goddess of wisdom, was often depicted holding or with an owl.

Perhaps, this is where it was started.

Add:

http://www.owlpages.com/articles.php?sec...

Owls in Lore and Culture

Paper by B. G. Marcot, D. H. Johnson, & M. Cocker 2000-06-15, last updated 2006-11-04

MARKERS OF GODS, KNOWLEDGE, WISDOM, AND FERTILITY

Many children have grown up with nursery stories of wise old owls. From the ancient Greek legends to the wise owls in Wini the Pooh and The Owl and The Pussycat, we have all seen images in folk tales of owls as the quintessential bearers of knowledge and sagacity.

From ancient Athens, the silver four-drachma coin bore the image of the owl on the obverse side as a symbol of the city's patron, Athene Pronoia, the Greek goddess of wisdom who, in an earlier incarnation, was goddess of darkness. The owl -- whose modern scientific name Athene carries this heritage -- came to represent wisdom from its association with the dark (Saunders 1995). The owl was also the guardian of the Acropolis (Holmgren 1988), and the Roman statesman Pliny the Elder wrote that owls foretell only evil and are to be dreaded more than all other birds (Rackham 1997, as recounted in Martin 1996).

In many other cultures, owls represent wisdom and knowledge because their nocturnal vigilance is associated with that of the studious scholar or wise elder (Saunders 1995). According to....

http://nativeamericans.mrdonn.org/storie...

Wise Owl

A Woodland Indian Myth

    There is an old saying, "wise as an owl".  People are always saying that, but the truth is, owls were not always wise.

    Once upon a time, a long time ago,.......

http://www.famousquotes.me.uk/nursery_rh...

A wise old owl nursery rhyme: origins & history

A wise old owl lived in an oak

The more he saw the less he spoke

The less he spoke the more he heard.

Why can't we all be like that wise old bird?