History of the Rhinoceros 167 



rhinoceros-horn is capable of being carved, but that the horn of a bovine 

 animal cannot be carved. These horns, biologically, are entirely dif- 

 ferent in origin and structure. The Chinese were quite right in re- 

 garding the rhinoceros-horn as a marvel of nature, for it is a unique 

 phenomenon of creation. It is composed of a solid mass of agglutinated 

 hairs or bristles, and has no firm attachment to the bones of the skull, 

 which are merely roughened and somewhat elevated so as to fit into the 

 concave base of the solid horn. Ox, sheep, or antelope, however, have 

 hollow horns; deer and giraffe, bony antlers. None of these is fit to be 

 worked into a cup ; and a cup carved from a horn can mean nothing but 

 one carved from rhinoceros-horn. Horns of bovine animals, as we all 

 know, may be utilized as drinking-vessels, or, as among primitive tribes, 

 as powder-flasks, or, as among the Tibetans, even as snuff -bottles, or, as 

 in India, to pour out holy water; but they are by nature made ready for 

 use, and do not require any carving. The se kung of antiquity are 

 certainly cups carved from rhinoceros-horn, 1 not cups of buffalo- 

 horn, as Mr. Giles (No. 10,298) has it in the second edition of his 

 Dictionary. 



Naturally, none of those ancient drinking-horns has survived, but at 

 a later time they were imitated in bronze. There are, at least, some 

 bronze drinking-cups preserved, which are connected by Chinese 

 archaeologists with the drinking-horns of antiquity. In the Po ku fu 

 lu (Ch. 16, p. 16) an illustration (Fig. 23) is given under the title Han 

 hi shou pei ("cup with the head of a sacrificial bull, of the Han period"). 

 A similar bronze (Fig. 24) is figured in the Kin shi so, with the legend 

 Chou se kung ("rhinoceros-horn cup of the Chou period"). 2 The text 

 of the Po ku fu lu quotes the passage of the Shi king in which the se 

 kung are spoken of (above, p. 159), and says that this bronze cup comes 

 very near to them. The bull-head is certainly a feature which originated 

 only subsequently in bronze-casting, when the accepted forms of the 

 horn cups were imitated in bronze. It is noticeable that the cup, as 

 figured in the Sung Catalogue of Bronzes, corresponds in a measure to 

 the form of a rhinoceros-horn inverted and hollowed out from the base. 



1 Likewise Palladius (Vol. I, p. 136) and Couvreur (p. 451). 



2 The authenticity of the specimen of the Kin shi so seems somewhat contestable. 

 The head is that of a stag, but is equipped with ox-horns. The dating in the Chou 

 period is arbitrary and unsupported by evidence. It is remarked in the explanatory- 

 text that it is not known whether the piece is a rhinoceros-horn cup (se kung). The 

 similarity of the two specimens (Figs. 23, 24) with the rhyton of the Greeks is appar- 

 ent, but there is no necessity of assuming an historical interrelation of the two types. 

 Both were independently developed from natural horns used as drinking-cups, 

 which were subsequently imitated in more durable materials, like clay and metal. 

 Moreover, the Greek rhyton has a feature lacking in the Chinese specimens, — a 

 single oblong loop-handle. 



