Unicorns are creatures that have long captured the human imagination. From antiquity to the eighteenth century, it was not uncommon for travel reports to include sightings of the shy, elusive animal. The fascination with the creature even led to a large-scale pharmaceutical scam carried out by Icelandic swindlers (but more on that later). Although few people truly believe in unicorns anymore, they have not entirely left the public imagination. In fact, unicorns appear all around us: in fantasy novels, in the form of stuffed animals, or as a popular decorative motif on everything from clothing to stationery. They are a recurring symbol in popular culture – but they are also much more than that. Unicorns are part of a cultural history more than 2,500 years in the making. Bernd Roling, professor of Medieval Latin and Neo-Latin literature at Freie Universität Berlin, has investigated their history together with Julia Weitbrecht, professor of medieval German language and literature at the University of Cologne. But let’s start at the very beginning.

A Legend Is Born

It is not entirely clear where the myth of the unicorn came from. “The first descriptions that we know of date back to the Hellenistic period,” explains Roling. Unicorns feature in several narratives from across classical antiquity, particularly in early attempts to describe and categorize the world and its fauna. For example, Indica is a second-hand account of India written by Greek physician and historian Ctesias of Cnidus in the fifth century. It is widely considered to include the first written description of a unicorn – a creature with a long, impressive horn in the middle of its forehead. Stories such as these were widely read and received great attention. Reports of unicorn sightings in the wild significantly increased as word of the mysterious creatures spread. Nowadays, it is assumed that these sightings were most probably of antelopes or rhinoceroses. After all, the modern image of unicorns had yet to assert itself; most early descriptions of unicorns depicted them as small, goat-like, agile creatures – and not the white horses we are familiar with today. It is also important to note that unicorns purportedly used their horns as a weapon. Encounters with such potentially dangerous creatures thus made an interesting addition to any travel report. The world at this time had yet to be scientifically studied or mapped. “The way people saw the world was also different. There was no clear boundary between myth and reality,” explains Julia Weitbrecht. This was a time of legend, of heroes and gods. “The idea of unicorns was so fascinating to people that the stories continued,” says Weitbrecht. A new text tradition was born: Unicorns featured in encyclopedias, academic treatises, and fictional works, which were in turn copied and took on lives of their own. The mythical beings stood the test of time – reaching peak popularity in Europe during the Middle Ages. Public fascination with the creature was further bolstered by the large number of travel reports – for example, from Marco Polo, who had most probably seen a Sumatran rhinoceros – that continued to be published.

The Miracle Cure

Many texts presented unicorns as mysterious creatures. Barring a few travelers, very few people had actually seen one. This made it very difficult for medieval writers to fact-check their sources. And the chances of finding one were considered practically impossible. The Physiologus, a collection of moralized beast tales that was one of the most popular and widely read books of the Middle Ages, claimed that only a virgin could tame a unicorn. Byzantine authors provided would-be unicorn hunters with the following tip: Anyone wishing to kill a unicorn should use bait in the form of a pure maiden or, at the very least, a heavily-perfumed young man dressed in women’s clothes. The shy unicorn will then lie down in the woman’s lap and fall asleep, at which point it can be caught and killed. But why did people want to hunt and kill unicorns in the first place? At this time, medical texts were ascribing unicorn horns with almost miraculous powers of healing. “Unicorn horns” were traded at market for exorbitant prices during the medieval and Early Modern period, and were often made into drinking vessels that could supposedly neutralize the effects of poison. Doctors readily prescribed their patients unicorn horn – ground down into a powder, mixed with water, and drunk – as a remedy for epilepsy or to aid childbirth. Benedictine abbess and polymath Hildegard von Bingen swore by the healing properties of unicorn horns.

However, this mystical panacea could not be locally sourced. During the fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries, reports circulated that placed Ethiopia, Sinai, southern Arabia, or India as the native home of the unicorn. Illustrations of the creature also started more closely resembling modern depictions: a white horse with a large horn in the center of its forehead. As the creatures were so elusive, access to unicorn horns was typically reserved for those who could afford it. Long horns were sold to princes and kings in Europe for vast amounts of money as early as the thirteenth century. “Traders in Iceland supplied the European market with walrus tusks and narwhal horns that were proudly displayed in cathedrals or royal collections as unicorn horns. It was only in the sixteenth century that people began to doubt their authenticity,” says Roling. This was when humanist scholars began to express skepticism surrounding the effectiveness of medieval medicine. However, this debate failed to undermine general belief in unicorns and their healing powers.

Suspicions that these trophies were not real unicorn horns began to arise in the seventeenth century when it was noticed that they bore a strong resemblance to walrus tasks and narwhal horns. A Danish king even launched an official investigation to get to the root of the issue. The deception was thus eventually discovered – but this did not affect the popularity of unicorn horn as a remedy for any and all ailments. The placebo effect ensured that unicorn horn-based remedies continued to be sold and administered to patients. The existence of unicorns was still undisputed at the time. After all, the sheer number of eyewitness accounts and written sources couldn’t be wrong, could they? This belief was also by no means outlandish for the time – it is worth mentioning that the existence of dragons and mermaids was also accepted as fact.

The Modern-Day Myth

This gradually began to change during the eighteenth and early nineteenth century. Slowly but surely, the unicorn was relegated to the realm of myth and legend. “While the scientists of the time did eventually remove unicorns and other fantastical creatures from their taxonomic records, they did have their misgivings,” says Roling. Sightings continued to occur – of unicorns in Ethiopia, dragons in Romania, and mermaids off the coast of Scotland. But at some point, modern science left unicorns behind. While these fantastic creatures are no longer found in zoology textbooks or serious taxonomic catalogs, they do live on as symbols in pop culture. Unicorns continue to fascinate us to this day, appearing in children’s books and fantasy films, as stuffed animals or internet memes, as well as in the realm of esoteric thought and spirituality. They are a unique part of our cultural history thousands of years in the making – so maybe there’s something magical about them after all.

---

This article originally appeared in German in the Tagesspiegel newspaper supplement published by Freie Universität Berlin.