An Interpretation of the Unicorn

THE unicorn, one of the most fabulous of all hybrid creatures, has appealed to the imagination as much as the dragon, from the early days of civilization to our own time. Not as old as the dragon, its features are not as ugly or repulsive. It has been traced (not very persuasively) to various species of animal, it has been linked vaguely to the heavens, it has found its way into legend, saga, allegory, even into the symbolism of the messiah. In each case, the explanations for its function in any one of these settings have never met with the approval of any number of scholars. Its most significant attributes include, first of all, the single horn, which is frequently spiralled, the speed of its action, its solitary habits and the colours ascribed to its body and horn. Like the dragon it is ambivalent in character: it can be very gentle and bestow a number of benefits; it can also be the most ferocious of adversaries. Here we are not concerned with all its many manifestations in various areas of the past but with those salient features which may lead us to a tentative and probable interpretation. We begin with the unicorn of the British Royal Coat of Arms where he is furnished with the body of a horse, the legs and hoofs of a deer, the beard of a goat, a long, grooved horn projecting from his forehead and the tail of a lion.x Even in our own century we are told that the horn is a symbol of the unity of the divine Father and his Son,2 but no one has ventured to establish a symbolic common denominator between the horn and divinity. He appears somewhat like a belligerent horse rearing before the lion, his neck arched, tail in the air, prepared to hurl the full strength of his body behind the horn's thrust. The whole attitude seems to be patterned after that of a horse coping with an enemy from the front, although the

Aesthetics · Art · Art history · Character (mathematics · Civilization · French horn · Interpretation (philosophy · Legend · Literature · Sociology · Unicorn · Classical Antiquity Studies · Folklore, Mythology, and Literature Studies · History · Philosophy

• I.—The Sark Hoard

  Open Access•David Frank Allen•Archaeologia•1971

  Add to list

• Unicorns cartoons

  Robert K Jackler, Divya Ramamurthi•Tobacco Control•2016

  Add to list