(light music)
- [Steven] We're in the the Cloisters,
part of the Metropolitan Museum of Art
in their wonderful unicorn tapestries room.
These were woven, we think, at the very end
of the 15th century or perhaps in the early 16th century.
And we know that because of the fashions
that the figures wear.
- [Beth] We also know that they were designed
and likely commissioned by someone in France,
but likely made in the city of Brussels,
which was known for its tapestry weaving.
- [Steven] These are so luxurious.
- [Beth] We're looking at a tapestry that was made for
the highest levels of the elite of Europe.
We can tell that by the way that they're dressed
in velvets and silks with rich gold brocades.
- [Steven] But we can also tell that
by the fineness of the tapestries themselves.
Not only are extremely expensive materials used
including metallic threads, silver and wool and silk,
but this is weaving of the highest quality.
We have very little information about who commissioned these
or where they were originally intended to be.
- [Beth] We do though know
that interest in the mythical beast of the unicorn
goes back to ancient Greece and Rome,
that there are numerous illustrations
of a woman with a unicorn in the middle ages.
- [Steven] And I think it's important to remember
that in the late 15th century
Europe was still being introduced to exotic animals.
It was still seeing for the first time,
new creatures from Asia and from Africa.
And so the idea of a unicorn
might not have seemed entirely implausible.
- [Beth] You could read about unicorns
in medieval bestiaries, but the basic story is this:
That a unicorn was miraculous.
It had healing powers, it was very difficult to hunt
and it could only be caught by a maiden,
that is by a virgin.
The unicorn is attracted to the maiden.
It puts its head in her lap and is then able to be captured.
This story also accrued religious meaning over time.
So the unicorn is associated with Christ
and the maiden who attracts
it is associated with the Virgin Mary.
- [Steven] We're not entirely sure which order
these tapestries should be viewed in,
or indeed, if there is an order at all.
- [Beth] But we're gonna follow the order
that's currently accepted.
And therefore, the first one is this scene
of leaving for the hunt.
- [Steven] This is an enormous textile
and the figures are life size.
We see these figures who are very finely dressed.
Even the dogs are wearing elaborate collars.
The men are speaking amongst themselves
and taking the dogs out, looking in various directions.
But if you look at the upper right corner
you can see that there's a boy gesturing,
perhaps he's spied the unicorn
and he's gesturing come this way.
- [Beth] What we have here is a pattern
known as mille-fleurs or a thousand flowers,
this dense design of foliage and flowers,
so that there's no sky,
there's no landscape going back into space.
And what we notice is something that we see
in virtually all the tapestries in this cycle,
the initials a and E tied together with a rope.
- [Steven] Art historians have worked very hard
to use those initials as identifiers
for the person who commissioned these
or for whom it was intended as a gift.
But so far, we don't have much to stand on
and there are a number of conflicting theories.
The second tapestry is among the most elaborate.
At its center is this classicizing fountain
and a unicorn kneels, placing his horn
into a stream fed by the fountain.
There's a menagerie of animals and hunters.
- [Beth] The unicorn's horn is purifying the stream.
This idea that the unicorn had healing properties,
especially in its horn.
And we know that this water is purified by the unicorn
because of the flowers that grow up
around the stream.
- [Steven] We see this amazing array of animals.
There are lions, a leopard,
perhaps a hyena and a large stag
and then at the fountain itself, two pairs of birds.
But the upper half of the tapestry is occupied by humans.
Here we see the hunters, they can't interrupt the unicorn
because it is engaged in a miracle.
- [Beth] And that was part of the myth,
that when the unicorn was doing something miraculous
it could not be hunted.
And one feels this arrested moment
where the unicorn can't be approached.
So all the figures are talking and gesturing
but nothing can actually be done.
- [Steven] The next scene is the largest of the tapestries.
Here, the unicorn makes a mad dash to escape the hunters
but is surrounded.
- [Beth] He dashes across a stream, traced by dogs,
completely surrounded by the hunters who aim lances at him.
- [Steven] This scene contrasts with the previous
which was quiet and still, this image is all action.
And it's not just the hunters and the unicorn.
- [Beth] If we look at the bottom of the stream
we can see animals who have clearly
been disturbed by the hunt that's taking place.
- [Steven] These two tapestries
present the landscape in a different way.
They don't present foliage from top to bottom
but give us some sky, give us a bit of a horizon line.
- [Beth] And here in this fourth tapestry
which the Met calls, "The Unicorn Defends Itself"
we once again see the unicorn surrounded by hunters,
but this time the unicorn is attacking with its horn.
It pierces a dog, and it lashes out
toward a hunter with its hind quarters.
We can also see that it's been wounded in its side.
And I think it would've been very natural
for a medieval viewer to look at that wound
in the side of the unicorn,
a creature which is understood to be very pure,
and think about the wound in Christ's side,
when he was crucified.
- [Steven] Art historians have been trying to untangle
the relationship between the narrative of the hunt
and allusions to the passion of Christ.
- [Beth] Well, we do know that all these things
were conflated together
in the middle ages and in the Renaissance,
love, the hunt, ideas of chivalry and the unicorn.
- [Steven] The next tapestry
shows two scenes simultaneously.
On the upper left is the culmination of the hunt.
The unicorn is slain.
The dogs have reached the unicorn,
two spears pierce it
and a sword is cutting at the back of its neck.
And clearly this is the end of the unicorn's life.
- [Beth] We see the unicorn being carried to a chateau
on the back of a horse,
its neck wreathed with oak leaves and a couple
with a crowd of people behind them emerge from the chateau
to come to receive the slain unicorn.
- [Steven] This is one of the most elaborate
landscapes of the series.
Not only is the chateau more elaborate
than any of the architecture we've seen thus far,
the hill continues beyond that
and we see yet another castle in the distance.
- [Beth] And here's where the narrative
seems to get a little complicated.
We have two surviving fragments.
Here, we see the unicorn enclosed in a garden.
That idea of the enclosed garden
is itself a symbol of virginity,
often associated with the Virgin Mary
- [Steven] These fragments pose real problems
to the linear narrative being told
in the previous textiles.
Here is a unicorn, but now in the garden we see dogs,
one of which seems attracted to the wounds
on the animal's back.
And then we see more dogs in the distance
and two human figures.
But if we look very closely
you can see the sleeve of yet another woman.
And presumably this is a maiden whose purity
has attracted this unicorn.
- [Beth] She has her arm around its mane
and appears to be caressing it.
So is this an alternate ending?
One which show us an entrapped unicorn
instead of a slain unicorn.
Or is this a moment when the unicorn is entrapped
by the maiden and hunters will come,
perhaps called by the man blowing the horn
to slay the unicorn?
- [Steven] The most famous tapestry
in the collection stands alone.
It shows the unicorn domesticated,
with a collar around its neck attached to a pomegranate tree
by a delicate chain and surrounded by a fence.
And like the fragments that we spoke of a moment before,
this throws into question, the linear narrative of the hunt
and this tapestry is more vertical in its orientation.
So was this tapestry meant to stand alone?
- [Beth] In the literature, unicorns are often associated
with someone who is so over the top in love
that they've given up everything,
that they're completely subdued.
And that seems to be the case with the unicorn here.
He's surrounded by a low fence.
He could certainly leap over that fence if he wanted to,
but he is subdued, he's captive to his love for the maiden.
That's one interpretation here.
- The unicorn stands directly beneath a pomegranate tree,
a traditional symbol of love and matrimony and fertility.
And so do two narratives exist here simultaneously?
- [Beth] And perhaps all of these associations
to Christ, to the Virgin Mary, to love, to the hunt,
come together and overlap in this series
which still continues to puzzle art historians.
(light music)