Miniature of a yale (two-horned beast)
From the manuscript Royal 12 C XIX, f. 30r, 13th century
The British Library, London

The yale was a mythical beast, antelope-like with boar’s jaws and two long, swivelling horns that could rotate independently for attack or defence. Mediaeval bestiaries placed it in distant Ethiopia, a land imagined as a source of strange and marvellous creatures, drawing on classical writers like Pliny the Elder to heighten its exotic appeal. Its depiction blended zoological curiosity with moral and theological symbolism, reflecting the era’s fascination with the unknown and the wondrous.