Read on Twitter
It’s #LockdownBestiary #unicorn day! Unicorns (animal w/ a horn) are real & many! Some even have several horns. How many unicorn types were there & did horns have special qualities? Many medics, scholars & naturalists sought answers. #TheMonsterFiles #monsters #HistSTM THREAD.
Above egs show long visual history of unicorns: Indus Valley, 2600-1900 BCE. Stamp seal and modern impression: unicorn and incense burner, @metmuseum
https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/324062">https://www.metmuseum.org/art/colle... and
https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/324062">https://www.metmuseum.org/art/colle... and
Pendant with Triton riding a unicorn-esque marine animal. German, Reinhold Vasters, c.1870–95. @metmuseum https://www.metmuseum.org/art/colle...
Unicorns appear in medieval bestiaries. Associated with purity, innocence & chastity; if they met a virgin, they would go to sleep on their lap. The hunter in this 13thC eg is leveraging that habit @BritishLibrary
http://www.bl.uk/manuscripts/Viewer.aspx?ref=royal_ms_12_f_xiii_f010v">https://www.bl.uk/manuscrip...
http://www.bl.uk/manuscripts/Viewer.aspx?ref=royal_ms_12_f_xiii_f010v">https://www.bl.uk/manuscrip...
Iconic unicorn tapestry series, La Dame à la licornes! Late 15th/early16th C @museecluny https://www.musee-moyenage.fr/collection/oeuvre/la-dame-a-la-licorne.html">https://www.musee-moyenage.fr/collectio...
Here is a charming wild man riding a unicorn. Late 15th C, @rijksmuseum https://www.rijksmuseum.nl/en/search/objects?q=unicorn&s=chronologic&p=1&ps=12&st=Objects&ii=1#/RP-P-OB-915,1">https://www.rijksmuseum.nl/en/search...
Narwhal tusk at @museecluny. Records place it in the treasury of the abbey of of St-Denis, just outside Paris, in 1495.
Bernhard von Breydenbach’s Peregrinatio in terram sanctam (Mainz, 1498) contains this woodcut of some of the animals B saw on his trek to Jerusalem – more for our bestiary. @metmuseum
Pierre Pomet, Histoire générale des drogues… (Paris, 1694), liv. II, 9 hits the nail on the head: there was not one unicorn, but many! The unicorn’s horn was believed to be a poison antidote.
Horns of narwhals (sea unicorns, if you will) were popular collector’s items. You can see one in Ole Worm’s mid-17th C curiosity cabinet (back left, vertical, skull attached).
Today& #39;s naturalists continue to find new 
https://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="🦓" title="Zebra" aria-label="Emoji: Zebra"> and https://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="🌱" title="Seedling" aria-label="Emoji: Seedling"> species. Some will have medicinal properties. In this sense, we are not so different from earlier communities eager to learn about unicorns. END.
