Legend Of The Vegetable Lamb Of Tartary

The Vegetable Lamb was a popular myth of the Middle Ages that described a live lamb growing from a very special plant. It was believed to come from a vast region of Europe and Central Asia known then as Tartary.

Medieval texts described two varieties of the Vegetable Lamb - the first produced little naked, newborn lambs inside its pods, and the other had a life-sized lamb, with bones, blood and flesh, attached by its belly button to a short plant stem. This stem was extremely flexible, so allowed the tethered lamb to graze on the vegetation around it. Once all the vegetation was eaten, or if the stem broke, the lamb would die.