The Palm » Detail from “The Start of the Hunt”

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Detail from "The Start of the Hunt"

The fern-like plants growing in the meadow in which the hunters and their dogs gather to hunt the Unicorn do not correspond to any European species of fern. E. J. Alexander and Carol H. Woodward, two botanists at The New York Botanical Garden who compiled a botanical key to the flora of the Unicorn Tapestries published in 1941, believed them to be young date palms that would have been reared from the seeds of dates imported from the East (Adolfo S. Cavallo, The Unicorn Tapestries, 1998). The date palm is not the only exotic species depicted growing alongside the native trees in the landscape of the tapestries; pomegranates are shown as well. While rare and unusual trees were planted in medieval hunting parks, neither of these two species would have been hardy in northern Europe. They may have been included for symbolic reasons. Learn more about The Unicorn Tapestries.

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