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Amongst the curious myths of the Middle Ages none were more extravagant and persistent than that of the “Vegetable Lamb of Tartary,” known also as the “Scythian Lamb,” and the “Borametz,” or “Barometz,” the latter title being derived from a Tartar word signifying “a lamb.” This “lamb” was described as being at the same time both a true animal and a living plant. According to some writers this composite “plant-animal” was the fruit of a tree which sprang from a seed like that of a melon, or gourd; and when the fruit or seed-pod of this tree was fully ripe it burst open and disclosed to view within it a little lamb, perfect in form, and in every way resembling an ordinary lamb naturally born. This remarkable tree was supposed to grow in the territory of “the Tartars of the East,” formerly called “Scythia”; and it was said that from the fleeces of these “tree-lambs,” which were of surpassing whiteness, the natives of the country where they were found wove materials for their garments and “head-dress.” In the course of time another version of the story was circulated, in which the lamb was not described as being the fruit of a tree, but as being a living lamb attached by its navel to a short stem rooted in the earth. The stem, or stalk, on which the lamb was thus suspended above the ground was sufficiently flexible to allow the animal to bend downward, and browze on the herbage within its reach. When all the grass within the length of its tether had been consumed the stem withered and the lamb died. This plant-lamb was reported to have bones, blood, and delicate flesh, and to be a favourite food of wolves, though no other carnivorous animal would attack it. Many other details were given concerning it, which will be found mentioned in the following pages. This legend met with almost universal credence from the thirteenth to the seventeenth centuries, and, even then, only gave place to an explanation of it as absurd and delusive as itself. Following the outline sketched in the preface, I shall, in this chapter, lay before the reader the story of the “Barometz” or “Vegetable Lamb,” as related by various writers, and shall then give my reasons for assigning to the fable an interpretation very different from that which has been hitherto accepted as the true one.

The story of a wonderful plant which bore living lambs for its fruit, and grew in Tartary, seems to have been first brought into public notice in England in the reign of Edward III., by Sir John Mandeville, the “Knyght of Ingelond that was y bore in the toun of Seynt Albans, and travelide aboute in the worlde in many diverse countreis, to se mervailes and customes of countreis, and diversiteis of folkys, and diverse shap of men and of beistis.” In the 26th chapter of the book in which he “wrot and telleth all the mervaile that he say,” and which he dedicated to the King, he treats of “the Countreis and Yles that ben beȝond the Lond of Cathay, and of the Frutes there”; and amongst the curiosities he met with in the dominions of the “Cham” of Tartary he mentions the following:—

Fig. 1.—The Vegetable Lamb Plant.

After Sir John Mandeville.

This plate illustrates that version of the Fable by which the “Vegetable Lamb” is represented as contained within a fruit, or seed-pod, which, when ripe, bursts open, and discloses the little lamb within it.

“Now schalle I seye ȝou semyngly of Countrees and Yles that ben beȝonde the Countrees that I have spoken of. Wherefore I seye you in passynge be the Lond of Cathaye toward the high Ynde, and towards Bacharye, men passen be a Kyngdom that men clepen Caldilhe: that is a fair Contree. And there growethe a maner of Fruyt, as though it weren Gowrdes: and whan thei ben rype men kutten hem ato, and men fynden with inne a lytylle Best, in Flesche, in Bon and Blode, as though it were a lytylle Lomb with outen Wolle. And Men eten both the Frut and the Best; and that is a great Marveylle. Of that Frute I have eaten; alle thoughe it were wondirfulle, but that I knowe wel that God is marveyllous in his Werkes.”[1]

[1] ‘The Voiage and Travaile of Sir John Maundevile, Knt.’ See Appendix A.

Sir John Mandeville appears to have never previously heard of this strange plant, but reports of its existence under various phases may be traced back, as we shall presently see, to a date at least eighteen hundred years earlier than that of his mention of it. As it is in the works of these older writers that we shall find the long-sought key of the mystery, we will set them aside for the present and follow the growth and dissemination of the fable.

Claude Duret, of Moulins, who, in his ‘Histoire Admirable des Plantes (1605),’ devotes to it a chapter entitled “The Boramets of Scythia, or Tartary, true Zoophytes or plant-animals; that is to say, plants living and sensitive like animals,” therein says:—

“I remember to have read some time ago in a very ancient Hebrew book entitled in Latin the Talmud Ierosolimitanum, and written by a Jewish Rabbi Jochanan, assisted by others, in the year of salvation 436, that a certain personage named Moses Chusensis (he being a native of Ethiopia) affirmed, on the authority of Rabbi Simeon, that there was a certain country of the earth which bore a zoophyte, or plant-animal, called in the Hebrew ‘Jeduah.’ It was in form like a lamb, and from its navel grew a stem or root by which this zoophyte or plant-animal was fixed, attached, like a gourd, to the soil below the surface of the ground, and, according to the length of its stem or root, it devoured all the herbage which it was able to reach within the circle of its tether. The hunters who went in search of this creature were unable to capture or remove it until they had succeeded in cutting the stem by well-aimed arrows or darts, when the animal immediately fell prostrate to the earth and died. Its bones being placed with certain ceremonies and incantations in the mouth of one desiring to foretell the future, he was instantly seized with a spirit of divination, and endowed with the gift of prophecy.”

As I was unable to find in the Latin translation of the Talmud of Jerusalem the passage mentioned by Claude Duret, and was anxious to ascertain whether any reference to this curious legend existed in the Talmudical books, I sought the assistance of learned members of the Jewish community, and, amongst them, of the Rev. Dr. Hermann Adler, Chief Rabbi Delegate of the United Congregations of the British Empire. He most kindly interested himself in the matter, and wrote to me as follows:—

“It affords me much gratification to give you the information you desire on the Borametz. In the Mishna Kilaim, chap. viii. § 5 (a portion of the Talmud), the passage occurs:—‘Creatures called Adne Hasadeh (literally, “lords of the field”) are regarded as beasts.’ There is a variant reading—Abne Hasadeh (stones of the field). A commentator, Rabbi Simeon, of Sens (died about 1235), writes as follows on this passage:—‘It is stated in the Jerusalem Talmud that this is a human being of the mountains: it lives by means of its navel: if its navel be cut it cannot live. I have heard in the name of Rabbi Meir, the son of Kallonymos of Speyer, that this is the animal called ‘Jeduah.’ This is the ‘Jedoui’ mentioned in Scripture (lit. wizard, Leviticus xix. 31); with its bones witchcraft is practised. A kind of large stem issues from a root in the earth on which this animal, called ‘Jadua,’ grows, just as gourds and melons. Only the ‘Jadua’ has, in all respects, a human shape, in face, body, hands, and feet. By its navel it is joined to the stem that issues from the root. No creature can approach within the tether of the stem, for it seizes and kills them. Within the tether of the stem it devours the herbage all around. When they want to capture it no man dares approach it, but they tear at the stem until it is ruptured, whereupon the animal dies.’ Another commentator, Rabbi Obadja of Berbinoro, gives the same explanation, only substituting—‘They aim arrows at the stem until it is ruptured,’ &c. The author of an ancient Hebrew work, Maase Tobia (Venice, 1705), gives an interesting description of this animal. In Part IV. c. 10, page 786, he mentions the Borametz found in Great Tartary. He repeats the description of Rabbi Simeon, and adds what he has found in ‘A New Work on Geography,’ namely, that ‘the Africans (sic) in Great Tartary, in the province of Sambulala, are enriched by means of seeds like the seeds of gourds, only shorter in size, which grow and blossom like a stem to the navel of an animal which is called Borametz in their language, i.e. ‘lamb,’ on account of its resembling a lamb in all its limbs, from head to foot; its hoofs are cloven, its skin is soft, its wool is adapted for clothing, but it has no horns, only the hairs of its head, which grow, and are intertwined like horns. Its height is half a cubit and more. According to those who speak of this wondrous thing, its taste is like the flesh of fish, its blood as sweet as honey, and it lives as long as there is herbage within reach of the stem, from which it derives its life. If the herbage is destroyed or perishes, the animal also dies away. It has rest from all beasts and birds of prey, except the wolf, which seeks to destroy it.’ The author concludes by expressing his belief, that this account of the animal having the shape of a lamb is more likely to be true than that it is of human form.”

We have an interesting record of another journey into Tartary, undertaken almost simultaneously with that of Sir John Mandeville, by Odoricus of Friuli, a Minorite friar belonging to the monastery of Utina, near Padua. The exact date of his departure on his travels is not mentioned, but he returned home in 1330, and the history of his adventures and observations[2] was written in the month of May of that year—thus taking precedence by about thirty years of the narrative of the old English traveller.

[2] ‘The Journall of Frier Odoricus of Friuli, one of the order of the Minorites, concerning strange things which he saw amongst the Tartars of the East.’—‘Hakluyt Collection of Early Voyages,’ vol. ii. 1809. See Appendix B.

Odoricus, describing his visit to the country of the “Grand Can,” says:—“I heard of another wonder from persons worthy of credit; namely, that in a province of the said Can, in which is the mountain of Capsius[3] (the province is called ‘Kalor’), there grow gourds, which, when they are ripe, open, and within them is found a little beast like unto a young lamb, even as I myself have heard reported that there stand certain trees upon the shore of the Irish Sea bearing fruits like unto a gourd, which at a certain time of the year do fall into the water and become birds called Bernacles; and this is true.”

[3] Probably an error of transcription for “Caspius.” The mountain of Caspius (now Kasbin) is about eighty miles due south of the Caspian Sea, and in Persian territory, near Teheran.

Fig. 2.—Portrait of the “Barometz,” or “Scythian Lamb.”

After Claude Duret.

In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries the “Scythian Lamb” was made a subject of investigation and argument by some of the most celebrated writers of that period.

Fortunio Liceti, Professor of Philosophy at Padua, writing in 1518,[4] gives his complete credence to the story of the little beast like a lamb found within a fruit-pod when it bursts from over-ripeness; and besides the above passage from Odoricus quotes another, by which it would appear that the worthy friar afterwards himself saw this botanical curiosity, and described it as being “as white as snow.” I have been unable to find this paragraph in the Hakluyt edition of Odoricus’s travels.

[4] ‘De Spontaneo Viventium Ortu,’ lib. 3, cap. 45.

Juan Eusebio Nieremberg, however, in his ‘Historia Naturæ’ (Antwerp, 1605), also quotes these two passages, and in exactly the same words. He probably copied them from Liceti, and not from the original.

Sigismund, Baron von Herberstein, who, in 1517 and 1526, was the ambassador of the Emperors Maximilian I. and Charles V. to the “Grand Czard, or Duke of Muscovy,” in his ‘Notes on Russia,’[5] gives further details of this “vegetable-animal.” He writes:—“In the neighbourhood of the Caspian Sea, between the rivers Volga and Jaick, formerly dwelt the kings of the Zavolha, certain Tartars, in whose country is found a wonderful and almost incredible curiosity, of which Demetrius Danielovich, a person in high authority, gave me the following account; namely, that his father, who was once sent on an embassy by the Duke of Muscovy to the Tartar king of the country referred to, whilst he was there, saw and remarked, amongst other things, a certain seed like that of a melon, but rather rounder and longer, from which, when it was set in the earth, grew a plant resembling a lamb, and attaining to a height of about two and a half feet, and which was called in the language of the country ‘Borametz,’ or ‘the little Lamb.’ It had a head, eyes, ears, and all other parts of the body, as a newly-born lamb. He also stated that it had an exceedingly soft wool, which was frequently used for the manufacturing of head-coverings. Many persons also affirmed to me that they had seen this wool. Further, he told me that this plant, if plant it should be called, had blood, but not true flesh: that, in place of flesh, it had a substance similar to the flesh of the crab, and that its hoofs were not horny, like those of a lamb, but of hairs brought together into the form of the divided hoof of a living lamb. It was rooted by the navel in the middle of the belly, and devoured the surrounding herbage and grass, and lived as long as that lasted; but when there was no more within its reach the stem withered, and the lamb died. It was of so excellent a flavour that it was the favourite food of wolves and other rapacious animals. For myself,” adds the Baron, “although I had previously regarded these Borametz as fabulous, the accounts of it were confirmed to me by so many persons worthy of credence that I have thought it right to describe it; and this with the less hesitation because I was told by Guillaume Postel,[6] a man of much learning, that a person named Michel, interpreter of the Turkish and Arabic languages to the Republic of Venice, assured him that he had seen brought to Chalibontis (now Karaboghaz), on the south-eastern shore of the Caspian Sea, from Samarcand and other districts lying towards the south, the very soft and delicate wool of a certain plant used by the Mussulmans as padding for the small caps which they wear on their shaven heads, and also as a protection for their chests. He said, however, that he had not seen the plant, nor knew its name, except that it was called ‘Smarcandeos,’ and was a zoophyte, or plant-animal. The numerous descriptions given to him,” he added, “differed so little that he was induced to believe that there was more truthfulness in this matter than he had supposed, and to accept it as a fact redounding to the glory of the Sovereign Creator, to whom all things are possible.”

[5] ‘Rerum Muscoviticarum Commentarii,’ 1549. See Appendix C.

[6] Author of ‘Liber de Causis, seu de Principiis et Originibus Naturæ,’ &c.

Shortly after the publication of the above narrative by Sigismund von Herberstein, and probably in allusion to it, Girolamo Cardano, of Pavia, carefully discussed the phenomenon in question in his work ‘De Rerum Naturâ,’[7] printed at Nürnberg in 1557. He endeavoured to expose the absurdity of the statements made concerning this “animal-plant,” and explained the physical impossibility of its existence in the manner described. He argued that if it had blood it must have a heart, and that the soil in which a plant grows is not fitted to supply a heart with movement and vital heat. He also pointed out that embryo animals, especially, require warmth for their development from the ovum, which they could not obtain if raised from a seed planted in the earth, demonstrating clearly enough that no warm-blooded animal could exist thus organically fastened to the earth. In reply, however, to a possible question suggested by himself, why there should be no plant-animal on land, seeing that there are zoophytes in the sea, he, with the weakness and indecision which were innate in his character, admitted that “where the atmosphere was thick and dense there might, perhaps, be a plant having sensation, and also imperfect flesh, such as that of mollusks and fishes.”

[7] Lib. vi. cap. 22.

This weak point in his argument laid him open to the criticism of his relentless enemy, Julius Cæsar Scaliger. Always on the watch to wound and harass Cardano with cutting satire and irritating gibes, this caustic persecutor lost no time in making his attack. In one of his “Exercitationes”[8] he thus personally addressed the object of his sneering disparagement:—

[8] ‘Exotericarum Exercitationum,’ lib. xv., “De Subtilitate”; ad Hieronymum Cardanum Exercit. 181, cap. 29. Frankfort, 1557. See Appendix D.

“You may regard as beyond ridicule this wonderful Tartar plant. The most renowned of the Tartar hordes of the present day, by its reputation, its antiquity, and its nobility, is that of the Zavolha. These people sow a seed like that of the melon, but rather smaller, from which springs and grows out of the earth a plant which they call ‘Borametz,’ i.e. ‘the Lamb.’ This plant grows to the height of three feet in the likeness of a real lamb, having feet, hoofs, ears, and a head perfect with the exception of horns, instead of which the plant has hairs in the form of horns. Its skin is soft and delicate, and is used in Tartary for head-gear. The internal pulp is said to be like the flesh of the cray-fish, and to have an agreeable flavour; but if an incision be made, real blood flows from it. The root or stalk which rises from the earth is attached to the navel of the lamb, and (which is more remarkable) whilst the plant is surrounded with herbage it lives as does a lamb, but as soon as it has consumed all within its reach it withers and dies. This does not happen by the arrival of the plant at any definite period of its growth, for it has been found by experiment that if the grass around it be removed it perishes. Another most curious circumstance connected with it is that wolves will eat it with avidity, though no other carnivorous animals will attack it. This,” says Scaliger, still apostrophizing Cardano, “is merely a little sauce and seasoning to your allusion to the fable of the Lamb; but I would like to know from you how four distinct legs and their feet can be produced from one stem.”

It is very remarkable that this dissertation of Scaliger, which is really a keen satire on Cardano, and a sarcastic repetition of his version of the fable with ironical comments thereon, has been almost invariably taken as serious, and regarded as an expression of his entire belief in the “Scythian Lamb,” as described. Of all subsequent writers on the subject, Deusingius[9] seems to have been the only one who clearly perceived Scaliger’s intention and meaning. Hence, many profound believers in the myth have claimed as their champion one who would have derided them for their credulity.

[9] Antonius Deusingius, Professor of Medicine, and Rector of the University of Groningen, in his ‘Fasciculus Dissertationum Selectorum,’ p. 598, printed in 1660, declares his own utter disbelief in this animal-vegetable monstrosity, and after quoting Scaliger, thus writes of him:—”Hæc equidem Scaliger, qui tamen ne serio historiam narrare credatur quam ipse revera pro fabulosa habet, nequaquam vero approbat, ut perperam de eo refert Sennert.”—Hyp. Physic. 5, cap. 8.

Claude Duret, for example, whose implicit faith in the marvellous zoophyte nothing could shake, quotes verbatim in its defence the remarks of “le grand Jules César Scaliger,” and asks[10] triumphantly—

[10] ‘Histoire admirable des Plantes,’ p. 322.

“Who cannot see plainly that Cardano, after having long doubted, and after having adduced philosophical arguments drawn from the works of Aristotle and other eminent writers, felt himself obliged and condemned to confess that in a place filled with heavy and dense air (such as is Tartary) the Borametz—true plant-animals—might exist as described, as well as sponges, ‘sea-nettles,’ and ‘sea-lungs,’ which every one knows are true zoophytes, or animal-plants.”

After this amusing assumption that the air of Tartary possesses the “weight” and “density” necessary for the production of plant-animals, Duret quotes from Sir John Mandeville’s book in the language in which it was originally written—the Romanic—the passage which I have extracted from the old English version of the enterprising knight’s ‘Voiage and Travailes,’ and also cites, in confirmation of the prodigy, the account given of it by the Baron Von Herberstein. He then strongly expresses his own belief that—

“Of all the strange and marvellous trees, shrubs, plants and herbs which Nature, or, rather, God himself, has produced, or ever will produce in this Universe, there will never be seen anything so worthy of admiration and contemplation as these ‘Borametz’ of Scythia, or Tartary—plants which are also animals, and which browze and eat as quadrupeds. … If I did not entirely believe this I would denounce it as fabulous, instead of accepting it as a fact; but those who are in the habit of daily studying good and rare books, printed and in manuscript, and who are endowed with great wisdom and understanding, know that there is no impossibility in Nature, i.e. God himself, to whom be all the honour and glory!”

Besides the authors already quoted, and others who merely copied the narratives of their predecessors, Guillaume de Saluste, the Sieur du Bartas, accepted as authentic the story of the Vegetable Lamb. In his poem “La Semaine,” published in 1578, in which the first few days of the existence of all terrestrial things are described reverently and with considerable power, he represents this plant as one of those which excited the astonishment of the newly-created Adam as he wandered on the first day of the second week through the Garden of Eden, the earthly Paradise in which he had been placed.

“Or, confus, il se perd dans les tournoyements,

Embrouillées erreurs, courbez desvoyements,

Conduits virevoultez, et sentes desloyales

D’un Dedale infiny qui comprend cent Dedales,

Clos non de romarins dextrement cizelez

En hommes, my-chevaux, en courserots seelez,

En escaillez oyseaux, en balènes cornues,

Et mille autres façons de bestes incogneues,

Ains de vrays animaux en la terre plantez,

Humant l’air des poulmons, et d’herbes alimentez,

Tels que les Boramets, qui chez les Scythes naissent

D’une graine menues, et des plantes repaissent;

Bien que du corps, des yeux, de la bouche, et du nez,

Ils semblent des moutons qui sont naguières naiz.

Ils le seroient du vray, si dans l’alme poictrine

De terre ils n’enfonçoient une vive raçine

Qui tient à leur nombril, et tombe le meme jour

Quils ont brouttè le foin qui croissoit à l’entour,

O, merveilleux effect de dextre divine,

La plante a chair et sang, l’animal a raçine,

La plante comme en rond de soymême se meut,

L’animal a des pieds, et si marcher ne peut:

[18] La plante est sans rameaux, sans fruict, et sans feuillage, L’animal sans amour, sans sexe, et vif lignage; La plante a belles dents, paist son ventre affamè Du fourrage voisin, l’animal est sémè.”

Joshua Sylvester, the admiring translator of Du Bartas,[11] gives the following version of the above lines:—

[11] ‘Du Bartas: His Divine Weekes and Workes, translated and dedicated to the King’s most excellent Maiestie by Joshua Sylvester, London. 1584.’