Rhinoceros horns may have magical powers

Posted in Animals, Conservation, Nature, Prehistory, Wildlife on Thursday, 3 January 2013

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This edited article about the rhinoceros originally appeared in Look and Learn issue number 804 published on 11th June 1977.

Woolly rhinoceros, picture, image, illustration

The prehistoric ancestor of the rhinoceros is the Elasmotherium or Woolly Rhinoceros, whose remains have been found in Siberia and even in England

Anyone who has seen a rhinoceros lumbering through the jungles of Africa or Asia might well imagine themselves in the prehistoric world of millions of years ago, when huge, monstrous-looking animals roamed the land. This is hardly surprising as its ancestors date back to 25,000,000 years ago. Although it is now considerably scaled down in size, it is still not unlike those frightening creatures of the prehistoric world. Even though the rhinoceros of today is a pygmy compared with its gigantic ancestors, it is with the exception of the elephant, still the largest animal on land.

Once a native of Europe, it is now confined to Central and South Africa, and to Southern Asia. There are five species, and three of them are to be found in Asia. The two African species vary in certain details from their Asiatic relatives, inasmuch as they do not have the same heavy folds, and have no front teeth in their jaws.

The Indian rhinoceros has one horn, and is distinguished by its thick skin which is folded in places and has something of the appearance of an ancient coat of armour. No rhino has the look of a fleet-footed animal, but the Indian variety has a particularly heavy and clumsy appearance.

The Java and Sumatran rhinoceros are small in size. The Sumatran is the smallest existing member of the group and has two horns.

The black rhinoceros of Africa also carries two horns, and despite its great bulk is an agile animal capable of bursts of great speed. Unlike the white rhino which feeds entirely on grass, it feeds mainly on roots, leaves and branches.

The most interesting of them all is undoubtedly the white rhinoceros, and the largest of the genus. It was first discovered in 1812 in the great tract of open grass land between the Orange and Zambesi Rivers. Its discovery was in one way a great tragedy, thanks to the so-called sportsmen of the nineteenth century and early twentieth century who ruthlessly and systematically shot down every one of them unlucky to come within range. The slaughter was carried out with such vigour, in fact, that it was almost exterminated.

This two horned creature has been put forward by some as the unicorn of the ancients, whose horn it was believed right up to the Middle Ages served as a defence against poison. When a poisonous draught was served in a rhino horn cup, the liquor was supposed to effervesce. This puts the oryx and the narwhal out of court as to being the true unicorn, as one might as well try to drink out of a sword scabbard as from an oryx-horn or a hollowed out narwhal tusk. At one time rhinoceros horn cups were used as poison detectors, so perhaps the theory is not quite so absurd as it first appears.

The history of the white rhinoceros does not end there. In the year of 1688, the teeth of an animal, then supposed to be of a marine monster were discovered at Chartham, near Canterbury. Subsequently similar remains were found, and it was decided that they belonged to an extinct species of rhinoceros. Later, entire carcases were found embedded in the frozen soil of Siberia. These were furnished with a coat of thick hair, but apart from that, it was found to be closely allied to the living white rhinoceros.

Because of its poor eyesight and generally sluggish disposition, a white rhino can easily be approached. Having said this, one must add it is a bad tempered creature that is likely to charge if molested.

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