Monokeros, Pliny's Unicorn

"[...] a very fierce animal called the monokeros, which has the head of the stag, the feet of the elephant, and the tail of the boar, while the rest of the body is like that of the horse; it makes a deep lowing noise, and has a single black horn, which projects from the middle of its forehead, two cubits in length." -- Pliny the Elder, Natural History (Book VIII, chapter 31)

Some of you may remember my 2005 Pliny's Unicorn from the now-defunct Elfwood gallery. Having learned a whole lot more about perissodactylans since, I've been meaning to redesign the creature, and #junicorn gave me the perfect excuse. (I also wanted to make a unicorn with stripes, which influenced the color scheme).

Monokeros is a late-surviving Southeast Asian hyracodontid, a distant cousin of modern rhinos and a closer relative of the titanic paraceratheriids. Like some taxa in the latter group, its upper lip and nose have fused to form a short trunk that it uses to browse in its native rainforest habitat. Monokeros uses its single horn to defend itself and its calves against predators such as tigers. The red, white and black color scheme was mentioned by several author in the antiquity, though they could not quite agree on the coloration of this "Indian ass". Aelian describes the animal well but calls them tawny, probably referring to a now extinct subspecies.

While rare and cryptic, the Monokeros isn't the last one of its kind. Two other related taxa, Karkadan and Indrik, are known from other parts of Eurasia.

Edit: added the location that I omitted from the original description.