bestiary

[ bes-chee-er-ee, bees- ]

noun

, plural bes·ti·ar·ies.

1. a collection of moralized fables, especially as written in the Middle Ages, about actual or mythical animals.

bestiary

/ ˈbɛstɪərɪ /

noun

1. a moralizing medieval collection of descriptions (and often illustrations) of real and mythical animals

Other Words From

• bes·ti·a·rist [bes, -chee-er-ist, -cher-, bees, -], noun

Word History and Origins

Origin of bestiary¹

1615–25; < Medieval Latin bēstiārium, neuter of Latin bēstiārius. See beast, -ary

Example Sentences

One person who has created comic books whose images were all drawn by AI is New York-based artist Steve Coulson, and his five-part The Bestiary Chronicles.

From BBC

A similar galactic bestiary populates the magnificent Hubble Deep Fields, earlier images from the Hubble Space Telescope that revealed smaller “fragments” of galaxies apparently in the act of merging to form the larger galaxies we see today.

From Scientific American

Designer Virginie Viard collaborated again with contemporary artist Xavier Veilhan who used a bestiary in house founder Coco Chanel’s apartment as a creative springboard for the carnival-like spring decor.

From Seattle Times

“Completing the Bestiary” is a set of handsome small pictures, painted on wool felt, whose semi-symmetrical contours suggest Rorschach blots.

From Washington Post

Naked mole-rats and blind mole-rats are now safely within the research bestiary.

From Salon

Related Words

• fantasy
• fiction
• legend
• myth
• parable
• tale
• yarn