Bibliography of Bestiaries and Related Literature (Selected)

Ancient Greek and Roman Sources

Aelian, On the Character of Animals
Aesop, Fables
Aristotle, History of Animals
Isidore of Seville, Etymologies
Lucretius, On the Nature of Things
Pliny, Natural History
Ovid, Metamorphoses
Solinus, Polyhistor
Unknown, Physiologus

Ancient Chinese Sources

Liu Xiang (劉向), Strategies of the Warring States (戰國策 Zhan Guo Ce). 202 BC-9 AD (The Western Han). [Relevant chapters: 狐假虎威 《戰國策·楚策一》; 鷸蚌相爭《戰國策·燕策二》; 畫蛇添足《戰國策·齊策二》]

Unknown, Classic of Mountains and Seas (山海經 Shanhai Jing). The 4th century BCE. [English Translation: A Chinese Bestiary: Strange Creatures from the Guideways through Mountains and Seas. Trans. by Richard E. Strassberg. University of California Press, 2022.]

Zhang Hua (張華), Records of Diverse Matters (博物誌 Bowuzhi). The 3rd century (The Jin Dynasty).

Zhuangzi (莊子), Zhuangzi (莊子). 476–221 BC (The late Warring States period) [Relevant chapters: “Carefree Wandering (逍遙遊 Xiaoyao you),” “On the Equality of Things (齊物論 Qi wu lun),” “Horses’ Hooves (馬蹄 Mati),” “Autumn Floods (秋水 Qiu shui).” 476–221 BC (The late Warring States period)]

Medieval Christian Bestiaries and Compilations

Barber, Richard (trans.). Bestiary: Being an English Version of the Bodleian Library, Oxford M.S. Bodley 764: With All the Original Miniatures Reproduced in Facsimile. Boydell, 1993.

Charbonneau-Lassay, Louis. The Bestiary of Christ, by Louis Charbonneau-Lassay (compilation). Reprint edition. Penguin, 1992.

Clark, Willene B. A Medieval Book of Beasts: The Second-Family Bestiary. Boydell, 2006.

Unknown, Dicta Chrysostomi. Austria, Göttweig, ca. 1140–50

White, T. H. The Book of Beasts: Being a Translation from a Latin Bestiary of the Twelfth Century. Putnam, 1954.

Early Modern and Modern Non-Christian Bestiaries and Compilations

Borges, Jorge Luis. The Book of Imaginary Beings. Viking, 2005 [1957].

Nie Huang (聶璜), Haicuo Tu (海錯圖, Illustrations of Ocean Creatures). 1698 (The Qing Dynasty).

Foster, Michael Dylan. The Book of Yokai. University of California Press, 2015.

Komatsu, Kazuhiko. An Introduction to Yōkai Culture: Monsters, Ghosts, and Outsiders in Japanese History. Japan Publishing Industry Foundation for Culture, 2017.

Meyer, Matthew. The Book of the Hakutaku: A Bestiary of Japanese Monsters. 2019.

Podwal, Mark. A Jewish Bestiary: Fabulous Creatures from Hebraic Legend and Lore. Penn State University Press, 2021.

Goodman, Lynn E. and MacGregor, Richard (translators), The Case of Animals Versus Man Before the King of the Jinn, Oxford, 2009.

Unknown, The Legend of the White Snake (白蛇傳). The 12th to 13th centuries (The Southern Song).

Scholarly Works and Secondary Sources

Bakewell, Sarah. Humanly Possible: Seven Hundred Years of Humanist Freethinking, Inquiry, and Hope. Penguin, 2023.

Baxter, Ron. Bestiaries and their Users in the Middle Ages. Sutton Publishing, 1998.

Chen, Huaiyu. Animals and Plants in Chinese Religions and Science. Cambridge University Press, 2023.

Flores, Nona C. Animals in the Middle Ages. Routledge, 2000.

Harden, Alastair, Animals in the Classical World: Ethical Perspectives from Greek and Roman Texts, Palgrave Macmillan, 2013.

Idema, et al. Mouse vs. Cat in Chinese Literature: Tales and Commentary. University of Washington Press, 2019.

Luo, Liang. The Global White Snake. University of Michigan Press, 2021.

Morrison, Elizabeth (ed.). Book of Beasts: The Bestiary in the Medieval World. Getty Publications, 2019.

Manes, Christopher, Other Creations: Rediscovering the Spirituality of Animals, Doubleday, 1997.

Peterson, Dale, The Moral Lives of Animals, Bloomsbury, 2011.

Stavans, Ilan. A Pre-Columbian Bestiary: Fantastic Creatures of Indigenous Latin America. Penn State University Press, 2020.

Sterckx, Roel. Animal and the Daemon in Early China. State University of New York Press, 2002.

Sterckx, Roel, Martina Siebert, and Dagmar Schäfer (eds.). Animals through Chinese History: Earliest Times to 1911. Cambridge University Press, 2018.

Tyler, Tom. Ciferae: A Bestiary in Five Fingers. University of Minnesota Press, 2012.

Wimpenny, Jo. Aesop’s Animals: The Science Behind the Fables. Bloomsbury, 2021.