A bestiary (from ''bestiarum vocabulum'') is a
compendium
A compendium (plural: compendia or compendiums) is a comprehensive collection of information and analysis pertaining to a body of knowledge. A compendium may concisely summarize a larger work. In most cases, the body of knowledge will concern a sp ...
of beasts. Originating in the
ancient world
Ancient history is a time period from the beginning of writing and recorded human history to as far as late antiquity. The span of recorded history is roughly 5,000 years, beginning with the Sumerian cuneiform script. Ancient history cov ...
, bestiaries were made popular in the
Middle Ages
In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the late 5th to the late 15th centuries, similar to the post-classical period of global history. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire ...
in illustrated volumes that described various animals and even rocks. The
natural history and illustration of each beast was usually accompanied by a moral lesson. This reflected the belief that the world itself was the
Word of God and that every living thing had its own special meaning. For example, the
pelican, which was believed to tear open its breast to bring its young to life with its own blood, was a living representation of
Jesus
Jesus, likely from he, יֵשׁוּעַ, translit=Yēšūaʿ, label= Hebrew/ Aramaic ( AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ or Jesus of Nazareth (among other names and titles), was a first-century Jewish preacher and religiou ...
. Thus the bestiary is also a reference to the
symbolic language of
animals in Western Christian art and literature.
History
The bestiary — the medieval book of beasts — was among the most popular illuminated texts in northern Europe during the Middle Ages (about 500–1500).
Medieval Christians understood every element of the world as a manifestation of God, and bestiaries largely focused on each animal's religious meaning. Much of what is in the bestiary came from the ancient Greeks and their philosophers. The earliest bestiary in the form in which it was later popularized was an anonymous 2nd-century
Greek
Greek may refer to:
Greece
Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe:
*Greeks, an ethnic group.
*Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family.
**Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...
volume called the ''
Physiologus
The ''Physiologus'' () is a didactic Christian text written or compiled in Greek by an unknown author, in Alexandria; its composition has been traditionally dated to the 2nd century AD by readers who saw parallels with writings of Clement of Al ...
'', which itself summarized ancient knowledge and wisdom about animals in the writings of
classical authors such as
Aristotle
Aristotle (; grc-gre, Ἀριστοτέλης ''Aristotélēs'', ; 384–322 BC) was a Greek philosopher and polymath during the Classical period in Ancient Greece. Taught by Plato, he was the founder of the Peripatetic school of ph ...
's ''
Historia Animalium
''History of Animals'' ( grc-gre, Τῶν περὶ τὰ ζῷα ἱστοριῶν, ''Ton peri ta zoia historion'', "Inquiries on Animals"; la, Historia Animalium, "History of Animals") is one of the major texts on biology by the ancient Gr ...
'' and various works by
Herodotus
Herodotus ( ; grc, , }; BC) was an ancient Greek historian and geographer
A geographer is a physical scientist, social scientist or humanist whose area of study is geography, the study of Earth's natural environment and human society ...
,
Pliny the Elder
Gaius Plinius Secundus (AD 23/2479), called Pliny the Elder (), was a Roman author, naturalist and natural philosopher, and naval and army commander of the early Roman Empire, and a friend of the emperor Vespasian. He wrote the encyclopedic ' ...
,
Solinus,
Aelian and other naturalists.
Following the ''Physiologus'', Saint
Isidore of Seville (Book XII of the ''
Etymologiae
''Etymologiae'' (Latin for "The Etymologies"), also known as the ''Origines'' ("Origins") and usually abbreviated ''Orig.'', is an etymological encyclopedia compiled by Isidore of Seville (c. 560–636) towards the end of his life. Isidore was ...
'') and
Saint Ambrose expanded the religious message with reference to passages from the
Bible
The Bible (from Koine Greek , , 'the books') is a collection of religious texts or scriptures that are held to be sacred in Christianity, Judaism, Samaritanism, and many other religions. The Bible is an anthologya compilation of texts ...
and the
Septuagint
The Greek Old Testament, or Septuagint (, ; from the la, septuaginta, lit=seventy; often abbreviated ''70''; in Roman numerals, LXX), is the earliest extant Greek translation of books from the Hebrew Bible. It includes several books beyond ...
. They and other authors freely expanded or modified pre-existing models, constantly refining the moral content without interest or access to much more detail regarding the factual content. Nevertheless, the often fanciful accounts of these beasts were widely read and generally believed to be true. A few observations found in bestiaries, such as the
migration
Migration, migratory, or migrate may refer to: Human migration
* Human migration, physical movement by humans from one region to another
** International migration, when peoples cross state boundaries and stay in the host state for some minimum le ...
of birds, were discounted by the
natural philosophers
Natural philosophy or philosophy of nature (from Latin ''philosophia naturalis'') is the philosophical study of physics, that is, nature and the physical universe. It was dominant before the development of modern science.
From the ancient wor ...
of later centuries, only to be rediscovered in the modern scientific era.
Medieval bestiaries are remarkably similar in sequence of the animals of which they treat. Bestiaries were particularly popular in
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...
and
France
France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Oceans. Its metropolitan area ...
around the 12th century and were mainly compilations of earlier texts. The
Aberdeen Bestiary
The ''Aberdeen Bestiary'' (Aberdeen University Library, Univ Lib. MS 24) is a 12th-century England, English illuminated manuscript bestiary that was first listed in 1542 in the inventory of the Old Royal Library at the Palace of Westminster. Du ...
is one of the best known of over 50 manuscript bestiaries surviving today.
Much influence comes from the Renaissance era and the general Middle Ages, as well as modern times. The Renaissance has been said to have started around the 14th century in Italy. Bestiaries influenced early
heraldry in the Middle Ages, giving ideas for
charges
Charge or charged may refer to:
Arts, entertainment, and media Films
* ''Charge, Zero Emissions/Maximum Speed'', a 2011 documentary
Music
* ''Charge'' (David Ford album)
* ''Charge'' (Machel Montano album)
* '' Charge!!'', an album by The Aqu ...
and also for the artistic form. Bestiaries continue to give inspiration to coats of arms created in our time.
Two illuminated
Psalters, the
Queen Mary Psalter
The Queen Mary Psalter (British Library, Royal MS 2 B.vii) is a fourteenth-century English psalter named after Mary I of England, who gained possession of it in 1553.Davenport 56-57. The psalter is noted for its beauty and the lavishness of its il ...
(
British Library
The British Library is the national library of the United Kingdom and is one of the largest libraries in the world. It is estimated to contain between 170 and 200 million items from many countries. As a legal deposit library, the British ...
Ms. Royal 2B, vii) and the
Isabella Psalter (State Library,
Munich
Munich ( ; german: München ; bar, Minga ) is the capital and most populous city of the German state of Bavaria. With a population of 1,558,395 inhabitants as of 31 July 2020, it is the third-largest city in Germany, after Berlin and Ha ...
), contain full Bestiary cycles. The bestiary in the Queen Mary Psalter is found in the "marginal" decorations that occupy about the bottom quarter of the page, and are unusually extensive and coherent in this work. In fact the bestiary has been expanded beyond the source in the Norman bestiary of Guillaume le Clerc to ninety animals. Some are placed in the text to make correspondences with the
psalm
The Book of Psalms ( or ; he, תְּהִלִּים, , lit. "praises"), also known as the Psalms, or the Psalter, is the first book of the ("Writings"), the third section of the Tanakh, and a book of the Old Testament. The title is derived f ...
they are illustrating.
Many decide to make their own bestiary with their own observations including knowledge from previous ones. These observations can be made in text form, as well as illustrated out. The Italian artist
Leonardo da Vinci
Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci (15 April 14522 May 1519) was an Italian polymath of the High Renaissance who was active as a painter, Drawing, draughtsman, engineer, scientist, theorist, sculptor, and architect. While his fame initially res ...
also made his own bestiary.
A ''volucrary'' is a similar collection of the symbols of birds that is sometimes found in conjunction with bestiaries. The most widely known volucrary in the Renaissance was
Johannes de Cuba's ''Gart der Gesundheit'' which describes 122 birds and which was printed in 1485.
Bestiary content
The contents of medieval bestiaries were often obtained and created from combining older textual sources and accounts of animals, such as the ''
Physiologus
The ''Physiologus'' () is a didactic Christian text written or compiled in Greek by an unknown author, in Alexandria; its composition has been traditionally dated to the 2nd century AD by readers who saw parallels with writings of Clement of Al ...
''.
Medieval bestiaries contained detailed descriptions and illustrations of species native to Western Europe, exotic animals and what in modern times are considered to be imaginary animals. Descriptions of the animals included the physical characteristics associated with the creature, although these were often physiologically incorrect, along with the Christian morals that the animal represented. The description was then often accompanied by an artistic illustration of the animal as described in the bestiary. For example, in one bestiary the eagle is depicted in an illustration and is said to be the “king of birds.”
Bestiaries were organized in different ways based upon the sources they drew upon. The descriptions could be organized by animal groupings, such as terrestrial and marine creatures, or presented in an alphabetical manner. However, the texts gave no distinction between existing and imaginary animals. Descriptions of creatures such as
dragons,
unicorn
The unicorn is a legendary creature that has been described since antiquity as a beast with a single large, pointed, spiraling horn projecting from its forehead.
In European literature and art, the unicorn has for the last thousand years o ...
s,
basilisk
In European bestiaries and legends, a basilisk ( or ) is a legendary reptile reputed to be a serpent king, who causes death to those who look into its eyes. According to the ''Naturalis Historia'' of Pliny the Elder, the basilisk of Cyrene i ...
,
griffin and
caladrius were common in such works and found intermingled amongst accounts of
bears,
boars
The wild boar (''Sus scrofa''), also known as the wild swine, common wild pig, Eurasian wild pig, or simply wild pig, is a suid native to much of Eurasia and North Africa, and has been introduced to the Americas and Oceania. The species is n ...
,
deer
Deer or true deer are hoofed ruminant mammals forming the family Cervidae. The two main groups of deer are the Cervinae, including the muntjac, the elk (wapiti), the red deer, and the fallow deer; and the Capreolinae, including the re ...
,
lions, and
elephant
Elephants are the largest existing land animals. Three living species are currently recognised: the African bush elephant, the African forest elephant, and the Asian elephant. They are the only surviving members of the family Elephantidae ...
s. In one source, the author explains how fables and bestiaries are closely linked to one another as “each chapter of a bestiary, each fable in a collection, has a text and has a meaning.
This lack of separation has often been associated with the assumption that people during this time believed in what the modern period classifies as nonexistent or "
imaginary creatures". However, this assumption is currently under debate, with various explanations being offered. Some scholars, such as
Pamela Gravestock, have written on the theory that medieval people did not actually think such creatures existed but instead focused on the belief in the importance of the Christian morals these creatures represented, and that the importance of the moral did not change regardless if the animal existed or not. The historian of science
David C. Lindberg
David Charles Lindberg (November 15, 1935 – January 6, 2015) was an American historian of science. His main focus was in the history of medieval and early modern science, especially physical science and the relationship between religion and sc ...
pointed out that medieval bestiaries were rich in symbolism and allegory, so as to teach moral lessons and entertain, rather than to convey knowledge of the natural world.
Religious significance
The significance shown between animals and religion started much before bestiaries came into play. In many ancient civilizations there are references to animals and their meaning within that specific religion or mythology that we know of today. These civilizations included Egypt and their gods with the faces of animals or Greece which had symbolic animals for their godly beings, an example being Zeus and the eagle. With animals being a part of religion before bestiaries and their lessons came out, they were influenced by past observations of meaning as well as older civilizations and their interpretations.
As most of the students who read these bestiaries were monks and clerics, it is not impossible to say that there is a major religious significance within them. The bestiary was used to educate young men on the correct morals they should display.
All of the animals presented in the bestiaries show some sort of lesson or meaning when presented. Much of the symbolism shown of animals. Much of what is proposed by the bestiaries mentions much of paganism because of the religious significance and time period of the medieval ages.
One of the main 'animals' mentioned in some of the bestiaries is dragons, which hold much significance in terms of religion and meaning. The unnatural part of dragon's history shows how important the church can be during this time. Much of what is covered in the article talks about how the dragon that is mentioned in some of the bestiaries shows a glimpse of the religious significance in many of these tales.
[
These bestiaries held much content in terms of religious significance. In almost every animal there is some way to connect it to a lesson from the church or a familiar religious story. With animals holding significance since ancient times, it is fair to say that bestiaries and their contents gave fuel to the context behind the animals, whether real or myth, and their meanings.
]
Modern bestiaries
In modern times, artists such as Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec
Comte Henri Marie Raymond de Toulouse-Lautrec-Monfa (24 November 1864 – 9 September 1901) was a French painter, printmaker, draughtsman, caricaturist and illustrator whose immersion in the colourful and theatrical life of Paris in th ...
and Saul Steinberg
Saul Steinberg (June 15, 1914 – May 12, 1999) was a Romanian-American artist, best known for his work for ''The New Yorker'', most notably '' View of the World from 9th Avenue''. He described himself as "a writer who draws".
Biography
S ...
have produced their own bestiaries. Jorge Luis Borges
Jorge Francisco Isidoro Luis Borges Acevedo (; ; 24 August 1899 – 14 June 1986) was an Argentine short-story writer, essayist, poet and translator, as well as a key figure in Spanish-language and international literature. His best-known b ...
wrote a contemporary bestiary of sorts, the ''Book of Imaginary Beings
The ''Book of Imaginary Beings'' was written by Jorge Luis Borges with Margarita Guerrero and published in 1957 under the original Spanish title ''Manual de zoología fantástica''. The subsequent English version contains descriptions of 120 myt ...
'', which collects imaginary beasts from bestiaries and fiction. Nicholas Christopher wrote a literary novel called "The Bestiary" (Dial, 2007) that describes a lonely young man's efforts to track down the world's most complete bestiary. John Henry Fleming's '' Fearsome Creatures of Florida'' (Pocol Press, 2009) borrows from the medieval bestiary tradition to impart moral lessons about the environment. Caspar Henderson's '' The Book of Barely Imagined Beings'' (Granta
''Granta'' is a literary magazine and publisher in the United Kingdom whose mission centres on its "belief in the power and urgency of the story, both in fiction and non-fiction, and the story’s supreme ability to describe, illuminate and ma ...
2012, University of Chicago Press
The University of Chicago Press is the largest and one of the oldest university presses in the United States. It is operated by the University of Chicago and publishes a wide variety of academic titles, including ''The Chicago Manual of Style'', ...
2013), subtitled "A 21st Century Bestiary", explores how humans imagine animals in a time of rapid environmental change. In July 2014, Jonathan Scott wrote ''The Blessed Book of Beasts'', Eastern Christian Publications, featuring 101 animals from the various translations of the Bible, in keeping with the tradition of the bestiary found in the writings of the Saints, including Saint John Chrysostom
John Chrysostom (; gr, Ἰωάννης ὁ Χρυσόστομος; 14 September 407) was an important Early Church Father who served as archbishop of Constantinople. He is known for his preaching and public speaking, his denunciation of abu ...
. In today’s world there is a discipline called cryptozoology which is the study of unknown species. This discipline can be linked to medieval bestiaries because in many cases the unknown animals can be the same, as well as having meaning or significance behind them.
The lists of monsters to be found in modern roguelike
Roguelike (or rogue-like) is a subgenre of role-playing computer games traditionally characterized by a dungeon crawl through procedurally generated levels, turn-based gameplay, grid-based movement, and permanent death of the player charac ...
games and RPGs RPG may refer to:
Military
* Rocket-propelled grenade, a shoulder-launched anti-tank weapon
**''Ruchnoi Protivotankoviy Granatomyot'' (Russian: ''Ручной Противотанковый Гранатомёт''), hand-held anti-tank grenade launc ...
(for example NetHack
''NetHack'' is an open source single-player roguelike video game, first released in 1987 and maintained by the NetHack DevTeam. The game is a fork of the 1982 game ''Hack'', itself inspired by the 1980 game ''Rogue''. The player takes the role as ...
, Monster Hunter
is a Japanese media franchise centered on a series of fantasy-themed action role-playing video games that started with the game '' Monster Hunter'' for the PlayStation 2, released in 2004. Titles have been released across a variety of platforms ...
and Pokémon) are often termed bestiaries.
See also
* Allegory in the Middle Ages
* List of medieval bestiaries
This is a list of medieval bestiaries. The bestiary form is commonly divided into "families," as proposed in 1928 by M. R. James and revised by Florence McCulloch in 1959–1962.
Latin bestiaries First family
The subfamily designated the "B- ...
* Marine counterparts of land creatures
References
*“Animal Symbolism (Illustrated).” OpenSIUC, https://opensiuc.lib.siu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2505&context=ocj. Accessed 5 March 2022.
*
*
*
*
*
*
*Morrison, Elizabeth, and Larisa Grollemond. “An Introduction to the Bestiary, Book of Beasts in the Medieval World (article).” Khan Academy, https://www.khanacademy.org/humanities/medieval-world/beginners-guide-to-medieval-europe/manuscripts/a/an-introduction-to-the-bestiary-book-of-beasts-in-the-medieval-world. Accessed 2 March 2022.
*Morrison, Elizabeth. “Beastly tales from the medieval bestiary.” The British Library, https://www.bl.uk/medieval-english-french-manuscripts/articles/beastly-tales-from-the-medieval-bestiary. Accessed 2 March 2022.
*“The Renaissance , Boundless World History.” Lumen Learning, LumenCandela, https://courses.lumenlearning.com/boundless-worldhistory/chapter/the-renaissance/. Accessed 5 March 2022.
*
The Medieval Bestiary
, by James Grout, part of the ''Encyclopædia Romana''.
* McCulloch, Florence. (1962) ''Medieval Latin and French Bestiaries.''
* Clark, Willene B. and Meradith T. McMunn. eds. (1989) ''Beasts and Birds of the Middle Ages. The Bestiary and its Legacy.''
* Payne, Ann. (1990) "Mediaeval Beasts.''
* George, Wilma and Brunsdon Yapp. (1991) ''The Naming of the Beasts: Natural History in the Medieval Bestiary''.
* Benton, Janetta Rebold. (1992) ''The Medieval Menagerie: Animals in the Art of the Middle Ages''.
* Lindberg, David C. (1992) ''The Beginnings of Western Science. The European Tradition in Philosophhical, Religious and Institutional Context, 600 B. C. to A. D. 1450''
* Flores, Nona C. (1993) "The Mirror of Nature Distorted: The Medieval Artist's Dilemma in Depicting Animals".
* Hassig, Debra (1995) ''Medieval Bestiaries: Text, Image, Ideology.''
* Gravestock, Pamela. (1999) "Did Imaginary Animals Exist?"
* Hassig, Debra, ed. (1999) ''The Mark of the Beast: The Medieval Bestiary in Art, Life, and Literature''.
Notes
External links
*
The Bestiary: The Book of Beasts
'' T.H. White's translation of a medieval bestiary in the Cambridge University
The University of Cambridge is a Public university, public collegiate university, collegiate research university in Cambridge, England. Founded in 1209 and granted a royal charter by Henry III of England, Henry III in 1231, Cambridge is the world' ...
library; digitized by the University of Wisconsin–Madison
A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. Universities typically offer both undergraduate and postgraduate programs. In the United Stat ...
libraries.
The Medieval Bestiary
online, edited by David Badke.
*
' at the National Library of Denmark.
*
' at the National Library of Denmark.
*
The Aberdeen Bestiary
' at the University of Aberdeen.
* ttps://web.archive.org/web/20150913011011/http://www.christiansymbols.net/index.php Christian SymbologyAnimals and their meanings in Christian texts.
Bestiairy - Monsters & Fabulous Creatures of Greek Myth & Legend with pictures
{{Authority control
Types of illuminated manuscript
Medieval European legendary creatures
Medieval literature
Zoology
*