Dogs were part of European civilization from the start, first as hunting dogs. Most knights kept hunting dogs at their manors. By the Middle Ages, there were many different breeds. Hunting required different sizes and skills in dogs: greyhounds and alaunts could catch up to running deer and pull them down, mid-sized running hounds tracked and chased the quarry, and bloodhounds tracked and killed downed animals. Mastiffs and similar dogs were used for guarding flocks. Hunting dogs were not exactly pets, since they lived in kennels, but some favorite hunting dogs were permitted to come into the castle hall and eat scraps. Dogs are described in bestiaries in terms similar to the modern phrase “man’s best friend”: dogs had been known to help solve crimes or to leap onto the funeral pyre of a dead master.
Venery was the art of using a variety of dogs as a team and employing strategy appropriate to the prey and the terrain. Hunting dogs went to the hunt on leashes, controlled by trainers who could follow the huntsman’s signals to leash or release their dogs at the proper time. Some dogs were leashed in pairs and released as packs, while others worked alone. Breeding the right kinds of dogs was its own full-time profession, as was training each type of dog to its task. Some particular dogs became internationally famous or were featured in poems about hunting, since they were the most outstanding of their type. They were sought after for breeding.
Small hunting dogs that ran in packs were known by many different names. They could have been different breeds or fairly similar. In medieval hunting treatises, they are known as brachets, crachets, harriers, coursers, or raches. They may have been similar to modern beagles, with large noses, droopy ears, and big eyes. They were strong and fast; their main job was to run fast and far. They were not expected to bring large prey down at the end of the run. Harriers were particularly trained to chase hares, but they also were used against other prey.
Greyhounds were large and thin. They were very fast, with narrow heads and large jaws. They hunted by sight and could catch up with a deer and bring it down with their jaws. Greyhounds came in different sizes and perhaps slightly different breeds; good greyhounds were bred in Scotland. They were supposed to have gentle dispositions outside of a hunt and were among the dogs permitted into the lord’s hall.
Alaunts were like greyhounds but were stronger and could hold a fiercer prey. They had larger, blunter heads and very strong jaws. They could be used for hunting deer but were the only kind of dog suitable for hunting wild boar. The heaviest kind of alaunt was also used for bearbaiting. They may have been similar to modern pitbulls or German shepherds, but, in the Middle Ages, the best ones came from Spain. Alaunts had more violent temperaments and were less intelligent than greyhounds. They had to be kept leashed and muzzled.
Lymers were specialized tracking dogs, very much like modern bloodhounds. They were kept leashed and were used to locate the scent of the quarry. They were trained to run long distances following a specific trail, to find it again if it were momentarily lost, and not to bark. Very few lymers were needed in a hunt, and they were trained to work alone. Lords who kept large packs of hunting dogs had at least 20 other dogs for every lymer.
Mastiffs were large, coarse dogs used as guard animals by shepherds and as hunting dogs for particularly difficult prey. Mastiffs were shaggy and large, and they were not purebreds. They had large teeth and often wore spiked collars, since they guarded flocks against wolves.
Spaniels and setters, and sometimes greyhounds, were trained to find and call attention to quarry, particularly kinds of birds such as quail or partridges. They went out with falconers, and at times the greyhounds needed to help a falcon kill a large bird such as a heron. Spaniels and setters only found and roused birds. Other small dogs had their roles, but not necessarily in an aristocratic hunt; terriers, for example, caught rats.
Royal kennels could be very large operations, with 30 full-time huntsmen and pages caring for up to 100 dogs. The chief huntsman and his clerk were at the top; at the bottom, some kennels allowed a few poor men to sleep with the dogs for no wages. The kennels were warm, safe places, better than the streets for the poorest.
Most huntsmen began as pages when they were young boys. They lived with the dogs and learned all their names, and they cleaned the kennels and changed the dogs’ straw bedding. Some kennels had straw-covered posts for the dogs to urinate on, with channels in the floor to carry the urine away. Kennels had enclosures where the dogs could walk and run, and the pages took them out for walks on the grass. Pages brushed the dogs and made leashes and collars. They looked for lost dogs, clipped toenails, and soaked sore feet in vinegar. They were in charge of feeding the dogs their ration of bread. Sick dogs might be fed tripe and blood from sheep, but healthy dogs were not fed meat at home. Their trainers wanted them to associate meat with hunting and expect to find it only in the forest.
As they got older, pages moved up to varlets, who helped handle the dogs on a hunt. They learned how to track animals and interpret their marks and droppings. They learned how to blow horns and how the hunt was organized. Although they no longer lived in the kennels, some were expected to keep a lymer in their rooms. As they moved up to the status of full huntsmen as adults, they received higher wages, grander clothes, and horses to ride. They still remained in close contact with the dogs, training them and maintaining the dogs’ primary attachment. They had to oversee and give orders to the varlets who held the dogs on leashes, and they carried yard-long sticks to slap against their boots as signals. They carried hunting horns and swords and knives to help finish off game. Lesser huntsmen who remained on foot carried spears.
Huntsmen wore practical clothes without loose sleeves or long tunics to catch on branches. In summer, they wore green, and in winter, gray. They wore unusually high leather boots as protection against brambles. Not all hunters followed these rules, but the professional staff in many illustrations appears to work with rudimentary ideas of camouflage. At other times, especially in the late Middle Ages, they wore the household livery, which may have been gaudy and very far from camouflage.
Hunting horns were most often made of the horns of cattle. Some were made of brass and operated like modern bugles. Horns made of cattle horn were often bound in silver or gold, and the most expensive royal horns were carved from ivory. All the hunters, professionals and aristocratic amateurs, carried horns. They were all expected to use a communications code of horn calls. Certain calls signaled types of deer or danger from wolves. Other calls told the hunters when to assemble or what to do with their dogs, and the dogs were trained to come to some calls. Some calls asked for water or help. One such music was reserved for the death of the quarry, and the dogs joined in with barking.
Dogs were expensive investments and merited more care than most medieval animals. When a lord took his dogs a long distance to hunt in a certain forest, he often arranged to carry them in baskets or cages. The dogs had to be in their best shape when they arrived. Some dogs that were used for hunting dangerous prey were given quilted dog armor to help guard against claws and teeth. Dogs were frequently wounded while hunting bears and boars. Their kennel staff used needles and thread to stitch gaping wounds and sometimes used the ammonia of urine to sterilize a wound.
The day before a major deer hunt, or very early the same morning, one or more lymers and their handlers scouted the forest for suitable quarry. Some medieval illustrations show huntsmen studying the deers’ droppings on a table; they were able to estimate age, size, sex, and general health. They studied other signs, such as where the deer had rubbed its antlers on a tree, and they measured the size and depth of its tracks. They wanted to find the best hart for the chase, and sometimes they were able to sight one and count the points on its antlers. Deer tend to stay in one area of forest, called a covert; before leaving, the huntsmen used the lymers again to tell whether the harts they were studying had left the covert or not.
After the preliminary work was completed by the professionals, the aristocratic amateur hunters arrived. As the hunt opened, huntsmen took groups of dogs to relay points, depending on the terrain. They expected the first dogs to drive the hart past them so they could release fresh dogs to join the tired ones. A huntsman and his lymer went to pick up the scent of the selected hart. When the huntsman was sure the hart had noticed their presence and was running away, he tied the lymer up and blew his horn. The running dogs entered the chase.
Huntsmen followed the progress of the dogs and communicated with each other by signaling with horns. Each hunter and his set of dogs (brachets, harriers, greyhounds, and alaunts) worked to follow the same hart, not other deer, and make him run until he was tired. A tired stag turned to fight with his antlers; this was known as the stag being “at bay.” Now the hunters and dogs closed in, and, after a short time when the huntsmen and dogs enjoyed the excitement, the hart was finished off with a sword or spear. The hunters blew their horns, and sometimes they permitted the dogs to bite the dead animal’s throat to keep their primitive hunting instincts fresh.
The dogs received their share of the kill in a ceremony called the curée. After the stag or boar was dead, the hunters leashed the hounds, which waited while the deer was cut up. The dogs eagerly awaited the portions left for them, which were entrails and blood-soaked bread. A hunter, or the lord, held the animal’s head over the portion for the dogs, and the other hunters blew their horns. The dogs were released to devour their portion. The lymer often received the prize of being allowed to chew on the head before it was taken back as a trophy.
The fallow buck was not hunted with the same scouting process using lymers. Hunting a buck was less organized; the pack of running dogs was permitted to find the scent on its own. Roebucks were the smallest deer, the least useful for feast tables. They had great running stamina, so hunters used relays of dogs to chase them. Some hunters did not consider them worth eating and used them only to train dogs.
Another medieval hunting method was to drive the quarry toward a hidden group of archers. This method may have been the oldest, and it seems to have been the Anglo-Saxon method; it was also used for does and hinds during their hunting seasons. Ladies who participated in hunting were restricted to this method, which was safer and usually took place in an enclosed park. The royal party with its ladies went to an appointed place, the tryst, and hid with their bows. Hunters with a few dogs drove the deer toward them. Sometimes long lines of people helped corral the deer into the preferred path toward the archers; they were known as the “stable.” Deer parks could be designed with natural features to create a stable, or hunters could put up barriers or nets. When the group of hinds ran past the hidden archers, the ladies could try their shooting skill. One arrow was not always enough to kill a deer, but the hunters were nearby to finish them off with knives.