Bestiary

2 definitions found

From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48 [gcide]:

  Bestiary \Bes"ti*a*ry\, n. [LL. bestiarium, fr. L. bestiarius
     pert. to beasts, fr. bestia beast: cf. F. bestiaire.]
     A treatise on beasts; esp., one of the moralizing or
     allegorical beast tales written in the Middle Ages.
     [1913 Webster]
  


           A bestiary . . . in itself one of the numerous
           medi[ae]val renderings of the fantastic mystical
           Zoology.                                 --Saintsbury.
     [Webster 1913 Suppl.]

From WordNet (r) 2.0 [wn]:

  bestiary
       n : a medieval book (usually illustrated) with allegorical and
           amusing descriptions of real and fabled animals