One-horned, corresponding to the word Monoceros, by which the original Hebrew REEM is translated by the Seventy. The Hebrew word means erect, and has no reference to the number of horns. Most interpreters now understand it of the wild buffalo of the Eastern continents, the Bos Bubalus of Linaeus, resembling the American buffalo, but having larger horns and no dewlap. This animal has the appearance of uncommon strength. The bulk of his body, and his prodigious muscular limbs, denote his force at the first view, Numbers 23:22. His aspect is ferocious and malignant, and at the same time stupid. His head is of ponderous size; his eyes diminutive; and what serves to render his visage still more savage, are the tufts of frizzled hair which hang down from his cheeks and the lower part of his mouth, Job 39:9-12 Psalms 22:21.

Wild buffalo occur in many parts of Africa and India, where they live in great troops in the forests, and are regarded as excessively fierce and dangerous animals. The hunters never venture in any numbers to oppose these ferocious animals face to face; but conceal themselves in the thickets or in the branches of the trees, whence they attack the buffaloes as they pass along.

In Egypt, as also in Southern Europe, the buffalo has been partially domesticated in comparatively modern times. Travelers also find it in parts of Syria, Persia, and India. It is less docile than the ox, retaining a remnant of ferocity and intractability, together with a wild and lowering aspect. It is commonly driven and guided by means of a ring in the nose. To the ancient Hebrews, however, it seems to have been known only in its wild state, savage, ferocious, and often immensely large.

Described as an animal of great ferocity and strength (Numbers 23:22, RSV, "wild ox," marg., "ox-antelope;" 24:8; Isaiah 34:7, RSV, "wild oxen"), and untamable (Job 39:9). It was in reality a two-horned animal; but the exact reference of the word so rendered (reem) is doubtful. Some have supposed it to be the buffalo; others, the white antelope, called by the Arabs rim. Most probably, however, the word denotes the Bos primigenius ("primitive ox"), which is now extinct all over the world. This was the auerochs of the Germans, and the urus described by Caesar (Gal. Bel., vi.28) as inhabiting the Hercynian forest. The word thus rendered has been found in an Assyrian inscription written over the wild ox or bison, which some also suppose to be the animal intended (Compare Deuteronomy 33:17; Psalms 22:21; 29:6; 92:10).

U'NICORN, n. L. unicornis; unus, one, and cornu, horn.

1. an animal with one horn; the monoceros. this name is often applied to the rhinoceros.

2. The sea unicorn is a fish of the whale kind, called narwal, remarkable for a horn growing out at his nose.

3. A fowl.

fossil unicorn, or fossil unicorn's horn, a substance used in medicine, a terrene crustaceous spar.

the rendering of the Authorized Version of the Hebrew reem , a word which occurs seven times in the Old Testament as the name of some large wild animal. The reem of the Hebrew Bible, however, has nothing at all to do with the one-horned animal of the Greek and Roman writers, as is evident from ( 33:17) where in the blessing of Joseph it is said; "his glory is like the firstling of his bullock, and his horns are like the horns of a unicorn ;" not, as the text of the Authorized Version renders it, "the horns of unicorns ." The two horns of the ram are "the ten thousands of Ephraim and the thousands of Manasseh." This text puts a one-horned animal entirely out of the question. Considering that the reem is spoken of as a two-horned animal of great strength and ferocity, that it was evidently well known and often seen by the Jews, that it is mentioned as an animal fit for sacrificial purposes, and that it is frequently associated with bulls and oxen we think there can be no doubt that, some species of wild ox is intended. The allusion in (Psalms 92:10) "But thou shalt lift up, as a reeym , my horn," seems to point to the mode in which the Bovidae use their horns, lowering the head and then tossing it up. But it is impossible to determine what particular species of wild ox is signified probably some gigantic urus is intended. (It is probable that it was the gigantic Bos primigeniua , or aurochs, now extinct, but of which Caesar says, "These uri are scarcely less than elephants in size, but in their nature, color and form are bulls. Great is their strength and great their speed; they spare neither man nor beast when once; they have caught sight of them" --Bell. Gall. vi. 20.-ED.)