Manticore

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File:Martigora ca 1652 (21203315).jpg
Manticore or "Martigora" ― Johannes Jonston (1652), Historiae Naturalis
Copperplate engraving by Matthäus Merian.

The manticore or mantichore (Latin: mantichorās; reconstructed Old Persian: Script error: No such module "lang".; Modern Template:Langx Script error: No such module "lang".) is a legendary creature from ancient Persian mythology, similar to the Egyptian sphinx that proliferated in Western European medieval art as well. It has the face of a human, the body of a lion, and the tail of a scorpion or a tail covered in venomous spines similar to porcupine quills. There are some accounts that the spines can be launched like arrows. It eats its victims whole, using its three rows of teeth, and leaves no bones behind.

Etymology

The English-language term manticore comes via Latin mantichorās[1][2] from Ancient Greek Script error: No such module "Lang". (martikhórās).[3] This in turn is a transliteration of an Old Persian compound word consisting of martīya 'man' and xuar- stem, 'to eat' (Mod. Template:Langx; mard + Script error: No such module "Lang".; ḫordan);Template:Efn[4][5][6] i.e., man-eater.

An early account of the manticore and of its naming occurs in Indica by Ctesias,[7] a Greek physician of the 5th century BC who worked at the Persian court during the Achaemenid dynasty. Ctesias based his report on the testimonies of his Persian-speaking informants who had travelled to India. He recorded the Persian-language name of the beast as martichora (Script error: No such module "Lang".), which translated into Greek as androphagon[8] or anthropophagon (Script error: No such module "Lang".),[9] i.e., "man-eater".[10][3]Template:Refn But the name was mistranscribed as 'mantichoras' in a faulty copy of Aristotle, through whose works the legend of the manticore was perpetuated across Europe.[11]

Ctesias was later cited by Pausanias regarding the martichoras or Script error: No such module "lang". of India.[12]

Classical literature

Script error: No such module "anchor". An account of the manticore was given in Ctesias's lost book Indica ("India"), and circulated among Greek writers on natural history, but has survived only in fragments and epitomes preserved by later writers.Template:Sfnp

Photius's Myriobiblon (or Bibliotheca, 9th century) serves as base text, but Aelian (De Natura Animalium, 3rd century) preserves the same information and more:

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[13][8] Aelian, citing Ctesias, adds that the Mantichora prefers to hunt humans, lying in wait and even taking down even two or three men at a time. The Indians, he continues, take the young captive and disable the tail by crushing it with a stone before the sting begins growing.[8]

Pliny's Aethiopian beasts

Pliny described the "mantichora" in his Naturalis Historia (c. 77 AD)[14] having relied on a faulty copy of Aristotle's natural history that contained the misspelling ("martikhoras").[11]

Pliny also introduced the confused notion that the manticore might occur in Africa, because he had discussed this and other creatures (such as the yale) within a passage on Aethiopia.Template:Sfnp[15]Template:Efn But he also described the crocotta and the mantichora of Aethiopia together, and while the crocotta imitated the voices of menTemplate:Efn the mantichora of Aethiopia also mimicked human speech, on authority of Juba II,[16] with a voice like the pipe (panpipe, fistula) mixed with trumpet.[17]

Legacy

Ctesias purportedly saw a martichora presented to the Persian king by the Indians.[8] The Romanised Greek Pausanias was skeptical and considered it an unreliable exaggerated account of a tiger.[12][11] Apollonius of Tyana also dismissed the mantichore as a tall tale, according to the biography by Philostratus (c. 170–247).[18]Template:Sfnp

Pliny did not share Pausanias' skepticism.[11] And for 1500 years afterwards, it was Pliny's account, also copied by Solinus (2nd century), which was held to be authoritative on matters of natural history whether real or mythological.[11] In the advent of Christianity, writings in the Holy Scripture combined with Plinian-Aristotelian learning gave rise to the Physiologus (also c. 2nd century), which later evolved into the medieval bestiaries[11] some of which contained entries on the manticore.

Medieval sources

Bestiaries

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The manticore has been included in some medieval bestiaries, with accompanying illustrations, though not all.

The thick-maned (and long-bearded) manticore wearing a Phrygian cap is a commonplace design (fig., top left).Template:Refn

In most instances, the manticora is "coloured red or brown and has clawed feet".Template:Sfnp Artists took the liberty of coloring the manticore blue at times.[19] One example is depicted "as a long-haired blond" (fig., top right).Template:Refn Another has the face of a woman and the body of a blue manticore (fig., bottom right) .Template:Refn

Most manuscripts do not bother detailing the scorpion tailTemplate:Sfnp and simply draw a long cat's tail,Template:Sfnp but in Harley MS 3244 the manticore has an "oddly pointed tail"Template:Sfnp or an "extraordinary spike on the end" of it,Template:Sfnp and a tail covered in spikes from end to end is shown on the manticore in several other second family manuscripts.Template:RefnTemplate:Sfnp

The three-rows of teeth are not faithfully represented except in some third family examples.Template:Sfnp

Manuscripts and text

Second Family

The manticore (Template:Langx) occurs in about half of the Second Family Latin bestiaries.Template:Sfnp The specific source used in this case was probably Solinus (2nd century),[20]Template:Refn

The text here describing the beastTemplate:Refn[21] differs little from Pliny's Latin version in language,[22] or the Greek version in content (paraphrased above).[23] This is naturally the case, since much of Solinus was recopied out of Pliny.Template:SfnpTemplate:Sfnp The manticora is here described as "bloody-colored"Template:Refn rather than "red like cinnabar".Template:RefnTemplate:Refn

The text concludes by stating that the manticore "seeks human flesh, is active, and leaps so that neither large spaces nor broad obstacles can delay it[21] (neither the broadest space nor the widest barrier can hinder it)".Template:Refn

H text

Actually there are two candidate sources given for the passage, "Solinus 52.37" and "H iii.8";Template:Sfnp this "H" being the pseudo-Hugh of Saint Victor De bestiis et aliis rebus, edited by Migne,Template:Sfnp[24] but this source has been regarded circumspectly as the "problematic De bestiis et aliis rebus" by Clark.Template:Sfnp

Transitional

The manticore also occurs in the earliest "Transitional" First Family bestiary (c. 1185),Template:RefnTemplate:Sfnp[25] and some Third Family codices as well, whose illustrations attempted to reproduce some of the finer details given in its text.Template:Sfnp

Confounding with other hybrid beasts

As aforementioned, the manticore is one of three hybrids from Aithiopia described together by Solinus,[26] appearing in (nearly) successive chapters of the bestiary.Template:RefnTemplate:Refn This created the groundwork for the beasts in adjacent chapters being confounded or amalgamated through scribal errors, as described below in the cases of bestiaries produced in France.

French mistransmission

The manticore is basically absent from the French bestiary of Pierre de Beauvais,Template:Refn which exist in the short versions of 38 or 39 chapters, and the long version of 71 chapters. Instead, there is a Chapter 44 on the "centicore" (or santicora, var. ceucrocataTemplate:Sfnp), which suggests manticore in name, but which is nothing like the standard manticore.Template:Refn[27]Template:Refn The name is thought to have arisen from misspellings of leucrocotta, compounded by the suffix replaced by -cora by scribal error.Template:Refn Due to further mistransmission, "centicore" became the French misnomer for the yale (eale), a mythic antelope which should be a separate entry in the bestiaries.Template:Refn

Neither manticore nor leucrotta (Template:Langx) appears in Philippe de Thaun's bestiary in Anglo-Norman verse.[28][29]Template:Refn

Post-medieval natural history

File:Animal drawings collected by Felix Platter, p2 - (45).jpg
A manticore and a crocotta. Prepared for Felix Platter's Historiae animalium (1551–1558).
File:ManticoraTHoFFB1607.png
Woodcut from Edward Topsell's The Historie of Foure-footed Beastes (1607)[30]Template:Refn

Edward Topsell, in 1607, described the manticore as:

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bred among the Indians, having a treble rowe of teeth beneath and above, whose greatnesse, roughnesse, and feete are like a Lyons, his face and eares like unto a mans, his eies grey, and collour red, his taile like the taile of a Scorpion of the earth, armed with a sting, casting forth sharp pointed quills, his voice like the voice of a small trumpet or pipe, being in course as swift as a Hart; His wildnes such as can never be tamed, and his appetite is especially to the flesh of man. His body like the body of a Lyon, being very apt both to leape and to run, so as no distance or space doth hinder him,.. Template:RefnTemplate:Refn

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Topsell thought the manticore was described by other names elsewhere. He thought that it was the "same Beast which Avicen calleth Marion, and Maricomorion" and also, the same as the "Leucrocuta, about the bigness of a wilde Ass, being in legs and Hoofs like a Hart, having his mouth reaching on both sides to his ears, and the head and face of a female like unto a Badgers".Template:RefnTemplate:Sfnp

And Topsell wrote that in India they would "bruise the buttockes and taile" of the whelp or cub they captured, causing it to be incapable of using its quills, thus removing the danger.Template:Refn This differs somewhat from the original sources which stated that they would crush the tail with stone to make them useless.

Heraldry

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The likeness of manticore or similar creatures by another name have been used in heraldry, spanning from the late High Middle Ages into the modern period. A number of broadly related terms are utilized in heraldry, including manticore, mantygre, satyral, lampago, and variant spellings.[31][32] Whether these are treated as variant terminology for the same charge or as distinct entities varies between different heraldic authorities.[32]

The mantyger is glossed as merely a variant reading of manticore in the OED,[33], while the heraldic scholar Arthur Charles Fox-Davies classed the "manticore", "mantegre", and "man-tiger" together as a variant of the "man-lion" or "lympago", a modification of the heraldic lion with a human face, with horns on its forehead.[34] However, the 17th century heraldry collector Randle Holme made a fine distinction between manticore and mantyger. Holme's description of the manticore seems to derive directly from naturalist Edward Topsell (cf. above),<templatestyles src="Template:Blockquote/styles.css" />

[The manticore has] the face of a man, the mouth open to the ears with a treble row of teeth beneath and above; long neck, whose greatness, roughness, body and feet are like a Lyon: of a red colour, his tail like the tail of a Scorpion of the Earth, the end armed with a sting, casting forth sharp pointed quills.[35]

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the face and ears of a man, the body of a Tyger, and whole footed like Goose or Dragon; yet others make it with feet like a Tyger,

Script error: No such module "Check for unknown parameters".etc., and also noting that they may be horned or unhorned.[36]

The manticore first appeared in English heraldry in c. 1470, as a badge of William Hastings, 1st Baron Hastings; and in the 16th century.Template:Sfnp

The mantyger device was later used as a badge by Robert Radcliffe, 1st Earl of Sussex, and by Sir Anthony Babyngton.Template:Sfnp The Radford[e]'s device was described as "3 mantygers argent" by one source, c. 1600.[37][5] Thus in heraldic discourse the term "manticore" became usurped by "mantyger" during the 17–18th centuries, and "mantiger" in the 19th.[5]Template:Refn

It is noted that the manticore/mantiger of heraldic devices has a beast of prey body as standard, but sometimes chosen to be given dragon feet.[5] The Radcliffe family manticore appears to have human feet,[32] and (not so surprisingly), a chronicler described as a "Babyon" (baboon) the device by John Radcliffe (Lord Fitzwater) accompanying Henry VIII into war in France.Template:Refn It has also been speculated the Babyngton device is intended to represent the "Babyon, or baboon, as a play upon his name", and it too also has characteristically "monkey-like feet".Template:SfnpTemplate:Refn

The typical heraldic manticore is supposed to have not only the face of an old man, but spiraling horns as well,[5][32]Template:Sfnp although this is not really ascertainable in the Radcliffe family badge, where the purple manticore is wearing a yellow cap[38] (cap of dignity [32]).

Parallels

Gerald Brenan linked the manticore to the mantequero, a monster feeding on human fat in Andalusian folklore.[39]

The Hindu god Narasimha is often referred to as a Manticore. Narasimha, the man lion, is the fourth avatar of Vishnu and is described as having a man’s torso and the head and claws of a lion.

In fiction

Dante Alighieri, in his Inferno, depicted the mythical Geryon as having a similar appearance to a manticore, following Pliny's description where it has the face of an honest man, the body of a wyvern, the paws of a lion, and the stinger of a scorpion at the end of its tail.[40]

Fine art

File:Kilpeck church stone carvings - geograph.org.uk - 875590.jpg
Manticore at the Church of St Mary and St David, Kilpeck, Herefordshire (12th century)

The heraldic manticore influenced some Mannerist representations of the sin of Fraud, conceived as a monstrous chimera with a beautiful woman's face – for example, in Bronzino's allegory Venus, Cupid, Folly and Time (National Gallery, London),[41] and more commonly in the decorative schemes called Script error: No such module "Lang". (grotesque). From here it passed by way of Cesare Ripa's Iconologia into the seventeenth- and eighteenth-century French conception of a sphinx.

Popular culture

In some modern depictions, such as in the tabletop role-playing game Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) and the card game Magic: The Gathering, manticores are depicted as having wings.[42] They are more specifically given "wings of a dragon" in the implementation of D&D′s 5th edition, according to the Monster Manual (2014),Template:RefnTemplate:Refn[43] though an earlier version of the manual described them as "batlike wings".[44]

In the animated sitcom television series Krapopolis, the character of Shlub is depicted as a "mantitaur" which is a half-centaur, half-manticore creature where he was the result of a union between a female centaur and a male manticore. In this show besides the fact that the manticores are depicted with dragon-like wings like other depictions of them, the manticores are shown to have dragon-like horns on their head.[45]

In the animated film Onward Octavia Spencer plays "Corey" The Manticore, a manticore who is the proprietor of the Manticore's Tavern.[46][47]

See also

Explanatory notes

Template:Notelist

References

Citations

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  1. ↑ Karl Ernst Georges: Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch. 8th ed., Hannover, 1918, vol. 2, col. 802, s.v. mantichorās. ([1])
  2. ↑ Félix Gaffiot: Dictionnaire latin-français. 1934, p. 974. ([2] → [3])
  3. ↑ a b Cf. Henry George Liddell & Robert Scott, A Greek-English Lexicon, Template:LSJ
  4. ↑ <Old Persian martijaqâra according to the NED, apud Template:Harvp, p. 142 n103
  5. ↑ a b c d e Template:OED; Murray, James A. H. ed. (1908) A New Eng. Dict. VI, s.v."manticore"
  6. ↑ "Manticora" s.v., Eberhart, George M. Mysterious Creatures: A Guide to Cryptozoology. Volume 1: A-M. ABC-Clio/Greenwood. 2002. p. 318. Template:ISBN
  7. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  8. ↑ a b c d Template:Harvp. Ctesias Indica Frag. 45dβ Aelian, NA 4.21;
    Scholfield, A. F. (tr.) (1918) Script error: No such module "URL".Script error: No such module "Check for unknown parameters". (Loeb Classical Library); Script error: No such module "URL".Script error: No such module "Check for unknown parameters"..
  9. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  10. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  11. ↑ a b c d e f Script error: No such module "Citation/CS1".
  12. ↑ a b Template:Harvp. Ctesias Indica Frag. 45dγ. Pausanias 9.21.4.;
    Jones, W.H.S.; Ormerod, H.A. (tr.), (1918) Script error: No such module "URL".Script error: No such module "Check for unknown parameters".; Script error: No such module "URL".Script error: No such module "Check for unknown parameters".
  13. ↑ Cite error: Script error: No such module "Namespace detect".Script error: No such module "Namespace detect".
  14. ↑ Template:L&S lists Plin. 8, 21, 30, § 75; 8, 30, 45, § 107. So the same passage may be designated variously as 8.21 (30), or 8.30 or 8.75 depending on the editor.
  15. ↑ Script error: No such module "Citation/CS1".
  16. ↑ Pliny 8. 107;
    Alternatively Script error: No such module "URL".Script error: No such module "Check for unknown parameters".=Script error: No such module "If empty".Script error: No such module "template wrapper".;
    Template:Harvp, Script error: No such module "URL".Script error: No such module "Check for unknown parameters". =Script error: No such module "URL".Script error: No such module "Check for unknown parameters".@Perseus Project
  17. ↑ Template:Harvp. Ctesias Indica Frag. 45dδ. Pliny 8.75;
    Alternatively cited as Script error: No such module "URL".Script error: No such module "Check for unknown parameters".=Script error: No such module "If empty".Script error: No such module "template wrapper".;
    Template:Harvp, Script error: No such module "URL".Script error: No such module "Check for unknown parameters". =Script error: No such module "URL".Script error: No such module "Check for unknown parameters".@Perseus Project
  18. ↑ Flavius Philostratus, The Life of Apollonius of Tyana, translated by F. C. Conybeare, volume I, book III. Chapter XLV, pp. 327–329.<templatestyles src="Template:Blockquote/styles.css" />

    And inasmuch as the following conversation also has been recorded by Damis as having been held upon this occasion with regard to the mythological animals and fountains and men met with in India, I must not leave it out, for there is much to be gained by neither believing nor yet disbelieving everything. Accordingly Apollonius asked the question, whether there was there an animal called the man-eater (martichoras); and Iarchas replied: "And what have you heard about the make of this animal? For it is probable that there is some account given of its shape." "There are," replied Apollonius, "tall stories current which I cannot believe; for they say that the creature has four feet, and that his head resembles that of a man, but that in size it is comparable to a lion; while the tail of this animal puts out hairs a cubit long and sharp as thorns, which it shoots like arrows at those who hunt it."

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  19. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  20. ↑ Template:Harvp. Due to the "three Solinus hybrids" being clustered into successive chapters. More on their interrelationships below.
  21. ↑ a b Template:Harvp "Manticore", pp. 142–143
  22. ↑ By comparison of Latin texts
  23. ↑ By comparison of English translations
  24. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  25. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  26. ↑ Template:Harvp: "three Solinus hybrids"
  27. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  28. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  29. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".. For example, "Cocodrille, p. 85" corresponds to folio 50r of Cotton MS Nero A V digitized @ British Library.
  30. ↑ Template:Harvp Fig. "The Mantichora".
  31. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  32. ↑ a b c d e Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  33. ↑ Template:OED; Murray, James A. H. ed. (1908) A New Eng. Dict. VI, s.v."mantyger", variant of Mantegar, Manticore.
  34. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  35. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1"., quoted in Template:Harvp.
  36. ↑ Template:Harvp, Second book, Chapter IX, XVII-XIX, p. 175, quoted in Template:Harvp.
  37. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1"., for "Radforde"
  38. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  39. ↑ Al Sur de Granada, pages 190-193, Gerald Brenan, 1997, Fábula - Tusquets Editores. Originally South from Granada, 1957
  40. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  41. ↑ Script error: No such module "Citation/CS1". traces the chimeric image of Fraud backwards from Bronzino.
  42. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  43. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  44. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  45. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  46. ↑ Script error: No such module "cite".
  47. ↑ Script error: No such module "cite".

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Bibliography

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  • Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  • Script error: No such module "citation/CS1". American edition, Clarkson N. Potter, Inc. 1976
  • Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  • Script error: No such module "citation/CS1"., Aelian, pp. 61–62; Pausanias, pp. 62–63
  • Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  • Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".; [ Reprint], C. N. Potter, 1976
  • Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  • Script error: No such module "citation/CS1". Translated from the Latin (Cambridge Univ. Library MS. Ii.4.26).

External links

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