Would you have thought that old bone finds from the Harz foothills were used as evidence of a prehistoric unicorn?
In 1663, fossilized bones from the Ice Age (Pleistocene) were found while mining gypsum in the Sewecken mountains (Seweckenberge) southwest of Quedlinburgs old municipal area. Not only did these bones probably come from different animals, but from different animal species. Nothing remains of the finds – nothing except written references and two drawings showing that the bones were attributed to a single animal – a unicorn.
The original report on this sensational find and a drawing, both now lost, are attributed to Johann Meyer, an astronomer and chamberlain from Quedlinburg. Famous scholars of the time – including Otto von Guericke and Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz – testified in their works that the skeletal remains, including vertebrae, rib arches, a few leg bones and a skull, belonged to a unicorn. The two skeleton drawings known today, which are depicted in the scientific works of Leibniz and Valentini, show a true mythical creature – a two-legged (!) unicorn, which of course never existed and which is quite dissimilar to a real land vertebrate. Many mysteries remain: (1) Which Ice Age animal bone or tooth was interpreted as the long horn of the unicorn? (3) What skeletons of land animals – such as deer, cattle and horses – looked like was already known at that time due to hunting and domestic animal husbandry, so why didn’t clever people arrive at a more realistic picture?
Today, a 2.5-metre-high replica based on the historical report and the two surviving illustrations welcomes visitors to the Museum of Natural History Magdeburg and regularly causes amazement and discussion. The “unicorn” has now become the museum’s mascot.
