imagi na ry animals
Imagina ry Animals The Monstrous, the Wondrous and the Human
Boria Sax
REAKTION BOOKS To the dragons!
Published by Reaktion Books Ltd 33 Great Sutton Street London EC1V 0DX, UK www.reaktionbooks.co.uk
First published 2013
Copyright © Boria Sax 2013
All rights reserved No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publishers.
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A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. isbn 978 1 78023 173 0 contents
' The True Unicorn 7 ( Animal Encounters 23 ) What is an ‘Imaginary Animal’? 37 * Every Real Animal is Imaginary 53 + Every Imaginary Animal is Real 79 , Monsters 95 - Wonders 131 . Creatures of Water 163 / Creatures of Fire and Air 187 '& Creatures of Earth 209 '' Shape-shifters 221 '( Mechanical Animals 237 Conclusion 249
4eferences 257 1urther 4eading 267 0cknowledgements 269 3hoto 0cknowledgements 271 2ndex 273 Creatures of fable from F. J. Bertuch, Bilderbuch für Kinder (1801). Some popular mythical creatures: 1, roc bird; 2, cockatrice; 3, phoenix; 4, unicorn; 5, tatary lamb; 6, dragon. one The True Unicorn
Now I will believe That there are unicorns; that in Arabia There is one tree, the phoenix’ throne, one phoenix At this hour reigning there Shakespeare, The Tempest (iii , iii)
By the start of the seventeenth century, the against himself. Topsell had been writing in a existence of the unicorn was widely doubted pe riod of intense religious conflict throughout among educated people. e Reverend Edward Britain and the rest of Europe. As a clergyman in Topsell, in his History of Four-footed Beasts and the Church of England, he sought divine instruc- Serpents and Insects (1658), had this to say about tion in what he believed was a universal language the sceptics: that transcended creeds: the natural world. Topsell did not claim to be a naturalist him - of the true unicorn, whereof there were more self, but he studied the lore of animals in old proofs in the world, because of the nobleness books, largely from pre-Christian times, in of his horn, they have ever been in doubt; by search of moral lessons. To give just one exam - which distraction it appears unto me that ple, he wrote in the dedication of his book, ‘Who there is some secret enemy in the inward de - is so unnatural and unthankful to his parents, generate nature of man, which continually but by reading how the young storks and wood - blindeth the eyes of God to his people, from peckers do in their parents’ old age feed and beholding and believing the greatness of nourish them, will not repent, mend his folly, God his works. 1 and be more natural?’ 2 He upheld the ant as an example of industry, the lion of steadfastness, e syntax here is a bit tangled, but he is accus - and the wren of courage. e overwhelming ing doubters of atheism, perhaps even of being number of the lessons he found in nature were under the sway of diabolic powers. moral or practical, not religious. But the capture Now, Topsell was actually a person of fairly of a unicorn had become an exceptionally intri - liberal inclinations, and certainly not one who cate allegory of the birth, Passion and execution habitually engaged in hunting for witches. e of Christ. purpose of this finger-pointing may have been e unicorn was also mentioned by several largely defensive – to head off charges of idolatry early theologians, and found its way into the
7 imaginary animals
Unicorn, from Conrad Gesner’s Historia Animalium (1551). Despite appearing in a book of natural history, this unicorn strikes a dignified, heraldic pose.
popular work known as Physiologus , probably In the European Middle Ages, the symbolism of written by Didymus of Alexandria near the end of the unicorn was far more important than any the second century ce . According to Physiologus , ques tion of its physical existence. People regarded the unicorn cannot be captured by force but will nature as composed of allegories, through which lay his head in the lap of a virgin, and allow him - God revealed a divine plan. e authors of medieval self to be led away. e author clearly identified bestiaries were not interested in documenting tales the virgin with Mary and the unicorn with Christ, about animals, only in expounding their symbolic saying of it: ‘neither principalities, powers, thrones, nor domin ions can comprehend him, nor can Hell hold him’. 3 Upset by this deification of an animal, Pope Gelasius i condemned the story of the virgin and the unicorn as heresy in 496 and had Physio logus placed on the Church’s list of for bidden books, but the tale continued to gain in popularity. Physiologus was not only copied but expanded and incorporated into other books, and it eventually provided the basis for the medieval ‘Virgin Capturing a Unicorn’, aer an illustration in a 12th-century European bestiary. It is hard to tell whether bestiaries, with their moralized natural history, the maiden is beckoning to the armed man or trying to that became popular around the eleventh century. shield the animal.
8 The True Unicorn
From the Unicorn Tapestries, Flanders, 1495–1505. e spear wound in the unicorn’s side is like that of Christ, and the holly around its neck recalls Christ’s crown of thorns. e man pointing on the le may anticipate the animal’s immanent resurrection.
meanings. e lore of the unicorn reflected not only of the fieenth century and now in the Cloisters traditional Christianity but also the practice of of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. chivalry, especially of courtly love. A knight was Here, a maiden and hunters are depicted going ex pected to be, like the uni corn, fierce and unyield - about the brutal work of capturing a unicorn as ing in battle yet endlessly gen tle in his devotion to a solemn ritual, rather like a Mass, aware that his lady, whom he would serve selflessly. they are sinners yet also cognizant that the trans - e allegories in the early bestiaries were fair ly gression is necessary for repentance and, finally, simple. As the eagle rejects any eaglets that will redemption. Late medieval and Renaissance not stare directly at the sun, for instance, so God pic tures of a virgin holding a slain unicorn on will reject any person who cannot bear the divine her lap at times resembled those of the pietà – light. Gradually, some of these extended meta - depictions of Mary holding the dead Christ. ph ors became more complicated, ambivalent But why was this allegory necessary? Its pur - and mysterious. ese reached a sort of culmin - pose was surely not to explain the story of Christ ation in the Verteuil tapestries, also known as the to the unlettered, for it was at least as compli- ‘Unicorn Tapestries’, produced around the end cat ed as the original tale. e story seems as much
9 ‘Sight’, one of a series of six tapestries representing the senses, Brussels or northern France, 1480–1500 ce . The mirror, a traditional attribute of the Roman goddess Venus, was often used in the early modern era as a symbol of feminine vanity, but here, contrary to convention, the woman is not looking into the glass. Instead, she is placing the mirror in front of the unicorn, which has its forefeet in her lap. e intricate allegory of this and the other tapestries in the series has not been definitively explained. One theory, however, holds that the unicorn represents the lady’s deceased beloved, to whom she will remain faithful. ‘e Unicorn Defends Itself,’ from the Unicorn Tapestries , Brussels or Northern France, 1495 –1505. e wounded unicorn is a symbol of Christ, and the hunters pursue it in a stylized, solemn manner, a bit like the re-enactment of the capture and Crucifixion of Jesus at a Mass. ‘The Unicorn in Captivity’, from the Unicorn Tapestries, Brussels, 1495–1505. This is the last in a series of tapestries showing the hunt, killing and resurrection of the unicorn, which form a complex allegory that has never been entirely explained. Here the unicorn, triumphant over death, is held only by a thin chain and a low fence, yet it willingly accepts the bonds of love. Raphael Sanzio, Woman with a Unicorn , 1505. e young woman is probably Giulia Farnese, who had been mistress to Pope Alexander vi . According to medieval legend, a unicorn can only be captured by a virgin, but this unicorn appears to be a toy. e woman’s expression combines worldly sophistication with childlike innocence and vulnerability. ‘e True Unicorn’. A variety of unicorn, formerly from the Museum of Rudolph ii, c. 1610 . In the early modern period, people oen explained the contradictory accounts of unicorns as references to different varieties. is one seems to be a donkey with the horn of an antelope. imaginary animals
J. J. Grandville, Repas de Corps , c. 1842. Here the unicorn, as an ‘imaginary’ animal, seems to have a special status in relation to his ‘real’ colleagues.
bes tiaries: they have a young maiden in a pretty To Find a Unicorn summer dress sit down in a field of wildflowers Let us suppose for a moment that there is a sud den beside the wood. Sure enough, aer a short time wave of unicorn sightings in, say, northern Minne- a unicorn approaches shyly and lays its head in sota. Several people feel either elated or disoriented, her lap. Immediately, men who have been lying in and the local mayors are under pressure to explain wait rush up and capture the unicorn. As antici - what is going on. Foresters search the woods but pated, it is an equine figure with a large horn in find no trace of the creatures. Cameras hidden in the middle of its head. the woods manage to take a few lovely shots of The unicorn is placed in a spacious pasture bears, but that is all. Traps are set up for the uni - sur rounded b y high walls and, just in case it might corn, but they only manage to snare the occasional somehow escape, fitted with a radio collar. But hunter. But the reports of unicorns continue, so, now the hard part begins. How does one deter - aer all else has failed, authorities resort to the mine whether a unicorn is authentic? at it time-honoured method described in medieval could only be captured by a maiden in a meadow
20 The True Unicorn
Bookplate of Mary Churchill, Belgium, 20th century. In this variant of the old legend, the lion captures the unicorn, which has been lured by a young woman not with weapons but with a paintbrush.
might seem like strong evidence, but it is only animal to old pictures of a unicorn, but which circumstantial. One might carry out a dna test pictures? Is a true unicorn large or small? Does it on the unicorn, but to what would you compare have a straight horn or a curved one? Is it black the result? In fact, the dna could only be used to or white? Per haps any captured unicorn could refute claims of authen ticity: if the result was close only be judged ‘inauthentic’, since it could never to that of a horse, people might say that the crea - do justice to our expectations. ture was ‘just a horse’. Depending on its dna , people might decide the animal was a goat or even a human being, but not a unicorn. In the end, the only way of checking would be to compare the
21 Gustave Moreau, Oedipus and the Sphinx , 1864. Oedipus and the sphinx gaze directly into one another’s eyes with a combination of fear and wonder. Oedipus appears a bit androgynous, and the picture was probably at least partly inspired by depictions of Eve and the dracontopede.