Zarafa - The Story of a Giraffe's Journey from the Plains of Africa to the Heart of Post-Napoleonic France

She was an intriguing royal gift and one that certainly caused a stir among the people of 19th century France. On Tuesday 31 October 1826, a young Masai girafffe - Zarafa - landed incognito outside the bustling port of Marseilles. Zarafa was the first living giraffe Europe had seen in almost 350 years and the first of her kind ever to arrive in France. She was a politically motivated tribute to Charles X from Muhammad Ali, the Ottoman Viceroy of Egypt, who hoped to forestall European intervention in his war against the Greeks. The gentle animal, however, soon became an adored celebrity in her own right, and the embodiment of an era in French history rich in new scientific and cultural ideas...