Top 10 Strangest Medieval Monsters
A rundown of the top ten strangest monsters in historic medieval European art. It was exceedingly difficult to narrow this list down to just ten.
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If you don’t know anything about Medieval art, you might reasonably assume old illustrated texts featured basic depictions of historical and religious figures. But medieval art is overflowing with absurdity — particularly when it comes to depictions of myth and monsters.
Beyond the legends of dragons and unicorns you might be familiar with is a truly insane world of lesser known ancient creatures which stretch the imagination with their utter bizarreness. So today, we’re going to take a look at the top ten strangest of these monsters:
0:00 Intro
0:47 10 – Monopod
1:14 9 – Bonnacon
1:41 8 – Sea Monk
2:06 7 – Salamander
2:37 6 – Amphisbaena
2:59 5 – Shurale
3:24 4 – Snail
4:00 3 – Blemmyes
4:27 2 – Vegetable Lamb
5:04 1 – Gryllus
5:30 Outro
Academic Sources:
Monopod Article - Marc Hartzman: https://www.weirdhistorian.com/monopod/
Bonnacon Article - Abigail Ahlers: https://blogs.getty.edu/iris/the-bonnacon-laughing-stock-of-the-medieval-bestiary/
Sea Monk Article - Alicia Ault: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smithsonian-institution/reports-sea-monster-looked-like-monk-wearing-fish-scales-horrified-renaissance-europe-180960885/
Salamander Article - Lita Liepa: https://www.lithacreationsfrance.com/en-us/blogs/news/salamanders-can-they-walk-on-fire
Amphisbaena Article - Madam Mythos: https://web.pdx.edu/~tdehart/Madam%20Mythos/Countries/Med/Profiles/Amphibeana/amphi.html
Snail Article - Madeleine S. Killacky: https://theconversation.com/why-medieval-manuscripts-are-full-of-doodles-of-snail-fights-206255
Blemmyes Article - justhistoryposts: https://justhistoryposts.com/2020/04/22/mythical-creatures-the-headless-blemmyes/
Vegetable Lamb Article - Matt Simon: https://www.wired.com/2014/04/fantastically-wrong-vegetable-lamb-tartary/
Most images from Wikimedia Commons
♫ Music credit to Hooksounds ♫
#Monsters #History #Myth
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