ii2 Chinese Clay Figures 



rhinoceros. Also 0. Keller 1 has arrived at the same result, and 

 reduced all ancient traditions and representations of the unicorn to the 

 Indian rhinoceros. This opinion seems to me fundamentally wrong. 

 Not one of the numerous variants of the ancient Indian tradition re- 

 garding the Hermit Single-Horn alludes in this connection to the 

 rhinoceros; he is miraculously born from a gazelle, and has received his 

 horn from the latter. 2 Single-Horn is not even his original name, but 

 this one was Antelope-Horn (Rishya-crihga) ; and according to Luders, 3 

 the name Single-Horn has arisen from the latter, owing to popular 

 etymological re-interpretation caused by the tradition, already appearing 

 in the Mahabharata that the penitent had a single horn on his head. In 

 other texts, the Padmapurana, Skandapurana, and Kanjur, he is even 

 equipped with two horns, while the versions of the Ramayana and the 

 Pali Jataka make no statement with regard to the horn. The Greek 

 Physiologus, in the story alluded to, avails itself of the word monokeros 

 (" unicorn"), which literally corresponds in meaning to Sanskrit Eka- 

 crihga, and describes the creature as a small animal resembling a buck, 

 without any qualities inherent in the rhinoceros; and this is plainly 

 corroborated by the illustration accompanying the Physiologus, in 



1 Die antike Tierwelt, Vol. I, pp. 415-420; this is presumably the weakest chapter 

 of an otherwise intelligent and excellent book. I do not understand how Keller arrives 

 at the opinion that the ancients in general treat monoceros, unicornis, and rhinoceros 

 as identical notions, and in most cases conceive them as the African rhinoceros. The 

 historical connection of the unicorn legend with Ekacringa has escaped Keller en- 

 tirely. 



2 The iconography of Ekacringa in Indian art has been traced by Luders and 

 Muller. It is notable that any suggestion of a rhinoceros is absent. As proved by 

 the masks of the hermit used in the dramatic plays of Japan and Tibet (Plate X), 

 he was conceived as a human being with a single, short, forked horn, or with 

 a very long, curved horn. The illustration of the Japanese mask is derived from 

 the work Nogaku dai-jiten (Dictionary of No Plays) by Masada Shojiro and Amaya 

 Kangichi (Tokyo, 1908; compare Bulletin de I'Ecole franqaise d' Extreme-Orient, 

 Vol. IX, 1909, p. 607). The Tibetan mask, much worn off by long use, was obtained 

 by me from a monastery of Bagme, in the western part of the province of Sze-ch'uan. 

 It is very striking that the rhinoceros hardly plays any r61e in the culture-life, folk- 

 lore, or mythology of India. The allusions to it in literary records are exceedingly 

 sparse. The word khadga appears but a few times in Vedic literature, a rhinoceros- 

 hide being mentioned in one passage as the covering of a chariot (Macdonell and 

 Keith, Vedic Index, Vol. I, p. 213, London, 1912). The animal is mentioned in the 

 inscriptions of King Acoka (third century B.C.); and the consumption of its flesh, 

 blood, and urine plays a certain r&le in Indian pharmacology (see Chakravarti, 

 Mem. As. Soc. Beng., Vol. I, p. 370, Calcutta, 1906; and Hooper, J. As. Soc. Beng., 

 Vol. VI, 1910, p. 518). It is very curious that no Indian record regarding rhinoceros- 

 horn cups and their antipoisonous virtues has as yet been pointed out; our information 

 on this point rests on Ctesias, Aelian (see below, p. 115), some Arabic authors, and 

 more recent observers like Linschoten and Garcia Ab Horto (Aromatum et simplici- 

 um aliquot medicamentorum apud Indos nascentium historia, p. 66, Antverpiae, 

 I 567), who says, " IUud tamen scio Bengala incolas eius cornu adversus venena usur- 

 pare, unicornu esse existimantes, tametsi non sit, ut ii referunt qui se probe scire autu- 

 mant." It remains to be pointed out also that the literatures of India contain no 

 accounts of unicorns. 



3 L. c, p. 28. 



