Primary Sources… The Horn of Windsor 16 Nov 2018November 19, 2018 The Horn of Windsor was a unicorn horn (alicorn) owned by Elizabeth I. The corpus of material surrounding both the Martin Frobisher voyages and unicorns links the Horn of Windsor…
Sound… What Unicorns Sound Like 10 Jul 2018September 29, 2018 We now know what unicorns sound like. Narwhal tusks were often viewed as being unicorn horns (alicorn) during the medieval and early modern periods, in part because they are long…
Documents… Unicorns in Java 27 Jul 2017September 29, 2018 In 1613, Samuel Purchas published Purchas his pilgrimage. Or Relations of the vvorld and the religions obserued in all ages and places discouered, from the Creation vnto this present In…
Art… The Unicorn in Raleigh, NC 21 Feb 2017October 2, 2018 The North Carolina Museum of Art houses The Triumph of Chastity (ca. 1450-1460), a painting produced by the workshop of Apollonio di Giovanni di Tommaso. The painting was probably presented…
Art… The Virgin Bride and the Unicorn 11 Jan 2017October 4, 2018 Around 1494, to celebrate either the engagement or marriage of Matteo di Sebastiano di Bernardino Goazzadini to Ginevra d'Antonio Lupari Goazzadini, artist Maestro delle Storie del Pane painted the portraits of…
Documents… The Unicorn in Fabyn’s Cronycle 11 Nov 2016October 2, 2018 Robert Fabyan (1455? – 1512) was a draper, sheriff, and author of Fabyans cronycle. The Cronycle recounted English and French history covering the time period from the legendary first king…
Documents… Unicorns in Shakespeare 20 Oct 2016September 29, 2018 William Shakespeare mentioned unicorns three times in his plays: Julius Caesar (1599), Timon of Athens (1605), and The Tempest (1610). In Julius Caesar, Decius described how a unicorn could be caught by a…
Uncategorized The Savages say there be Unicorns – How a Unicorn appeared on a French Map from 1546 23 Sep 2016September 23, 2016 On a map created by Frenchman Pierre Desceliers in 1546, a solitary white unicorn appeared situated between Penobscot Bay and Cape Cod. How did it get there? …
Uncategorized Unicorns and the Northwest Passage 2 Sep 2016September 29, 2018 In 1576, Humphry Gilbert published A discourse of a discouerie for a new passage to Cataia to drum up the political and economic support he needed to raise a venture…
Uncategorized Doubting Unicorns and their Horns 27 Aug 2016September 21, 2016 Thomas Browne was an English physician and author. In 1646, he wrote a book entitled Pseudodoxia Epidemica which he subtitled Inquiries in Vulgar and Common Errors where he tackled topics ranging…
Uncategorized A surgeon’s advice for what to do when you have a patient to treat but you’re fresh out of unicorn horn. 26 Aug 2016August 26, 2016 John Woodall was a surgeon who held a variety of jobs including stocking the medical chests of the ships bound in the service of the East India Company, the army,…
Uncategorized Of the Unicorns of the Temple of Mecca 2 Aug 2016September 21, 2016 This account arrived to me through a circuitous route - and it may be best to trace to the path of the account's publication to contextualize the relation of…
Uncategorized The Unicorn in Laurence Andrew’s The Noble Lyfe / Hortus Sanitatis 1 Aug 2016August 1, 2016 Laurence Andrew (fl. 1510-1537) was a printer and translator active in Antwerp. Not much is known about him and many of the works he translated and/or printed have not survived…
Uncategorized The Unicorn in Clariodus 24 Jul 2016July 25, 2016 Clariodus: A Metrical Romance is a peculiar poem. The author is unknown and the poem was probably based on the French work entitled Cleriadus et Meliadice from c. 1440. The…
Documents… Martin Luther and the Unicorn Horn 30 Jun 2016October 4, 2018 Martin Luther, the leading figure of the Protestant Reformation, spent his last three days on earth working. He delivered a sermon that in part encouraged Jews to convert to Christianity…
Documents… Alicorn 20 Jun 2016September 29, 2018 Sea Unicorns from The History of Barados, St. Christophers, Mevis, St Vincents, Antego, Martinico, Monserrat, and the rest of the Caribby-Islands (London, 1666). One of the first pieces of Anglo-American…
Ancient World… The Unicorn in the Physiologus and Bestiaries 15 Jun 2016October 4, 2018 Medieval Christian scholars across Europe read the Physiologus making the book's circulation second only to that of the Bible.” The Physiologus was based on Indian, Hebrew, and Egyptian legends that later…
Bible… Unicorns in the Bible 13 Jun 2016October 4, 2018 Numbers 23:22-23 from the Geneva Bible (1560) The unicorn existed in the ancient world as well as appeared in the unchallengeable Christian text, the Bible. Various editions of the English…
Ancient World… Ancient Authorities on the Unicorn 13 Jun 2016September 29, 2018 Many early-modern Europeans believed in the existence of unicorns, in part, due to the writings of ancient authorities. Ctesias (ca. 400 BCE), the Greek physician who served the Persian…
