Page "Unicorn" Paragraph 74

The unicorn horns often found in cabinets of curiosities and other contexts in Medieval and Renaissance Europe, were very often examples of the distinctive straight spiral single tusk of the narwhal ( Monodon monoceros ), an Arctic cetacean, as Danish zoologist Ole Worm established in 1638.

They were brought south as a very valuable trade, and sold as horns from the legendary unicorn ; being of ivory, they passed the various tests intended to spot fake unicorn horns.

As these ' horns ' were considered to have magic powers, Vikings and other northern traders were able to sell them for many times their weight in gold.

Elizabeth I of England kept a " unicorn horn " in her cabinet of curiosities, brought back by Arctic explorer Martin Frobisher on his return from Labrador in 1577.

The usual depiction of the spiral unicorn horn in art, derives from these.