The Unicorn and its Relation with Gender Throughout the Ages

Wednesday, November 20, 3:30pm – 5:00pm, via Zoom

Evie  Houston

Dr. Laurel Taylor, Art History

During the Middle Ages, the unicorn was adored by European society; it was a popular motif that appeared in fine art, crafts, bestiaries, and medicinal texts. One of the most notable representations of the unicorn appears in the famous tapestries The Hunt of the Unicorn and The Lady with The Unicorn made in the late fifteenth century.  This paper examines the imagery and symbolism in these tapestries and the ways in which the unicorn has historically maneuvered in between the realms of femininity and masculinity. There is an extensive historical representation of the unicorn and the maiden, with the two intertwined in many converging social narratives. The unicorn today is an icon for girlhood, continuing the connection between the unicorn and the feminine that persists in its current associations. Through comparison of modern fairy tales like The Last Unicorn by Peter Beagle, to representation of the unicorns in the Middle Ages, this paper establishes a modernization of the unicorn that has shifted its association from the masculine to the feminine.