Unicorn horn

A unicorn horn, also known as an alicorn, is a legendary object whose reality may have been accepted in Western Europe throughout the Middle Ages. Many healing powers and antidote's virtues were attributed to the horn of the unicorn. These properties, assumed real since the 13th century, made it one of the most expensive and most reputable remedies during the Renaissance, and justified its use in royal courts. Beliefs related to the "unicorn horn" influenced alchemy through spagyric medicine. The horn's purification properties were eventually put to the test in, for example, the book of Ambroise Paré, Discourse on unicorn - marking the beginnings of the experimental method.