From George Turberville’s The booke of Hunting (1576).
All sorts of ways to hack around on your dog, get it drunk on wine, and make sure it ingests a ton of black pepper!
My favorite malady for which Turberville’s prescription for keeping “Bytches from going proud.” I have a lot of problems with “proud Bytches” these days, so I was quite interested in how to prevent this condition:
Before a Bytche haue had whelpes, giue hir euery morning nyne dayes together, nyne graynes of Pepper in hir meate, and she shall not become proude. Put them in to hir, in some cheese, or breade, or hard meate (pg. 234).
It should be noted that the only hunting Turberville mentions is “venery,” which is hunting with scent hounds. The original word “hunting” originally only referred to venery. The word is etymologically connected to the word “hound.” Hunting originally referred only to using scent hounds to pursue game. The word has since lost its very specific meaning and now means any act of pursuing game with or without dogs.
The illustrations of bloodhounds in this book are quite, um, different. The dogs don’t look much like any bloodhound I’ve ever seen!
What did they call sighthounds in the 16th century?
Caius (1570)
http://books.google.com/books?id=y8kCAAAAYAAJ&dq=caius%20dog&pg=PA40#v=onepage&q=quick%20spying&f=false
The artist has such a primitive style that it is uncertain what these dogs really looked like. The language is tedious to read…
Interesting.
I came across a drawing in a similar style that was of a “bloodhound.” The dog did not have a smooth coat.
I have been trying to find it but alas, my tracking ability on this is not as keen as a blood hound’s… I wanted to share the link.
Maybe you know the drawing?
this is the drawing…
I don’t think that’s a St. Hubert hound.
That appears to be a type of land spaniel– perhaps one that had been outcrossed to a St. Hubert or bloodhound.
There is now some debate on whether bloodhounds and St. Hubert’s were the same breed.
I think the bulk of the evidence now suggests that that the bloodhound is an English and Scottish breed. The St. Hubert’s hound in Turberville’s booke of Hunting is black and longer in the leg than the many depictions of bloodhounds in the text, which are fallow and dun.
Pepper doesn’t work, you know. Mine get fresh ground pepper every other day to make their turmeric more bioavailable, and they are still very bitchly.
Ah, but you need to get them drunk on grog first.
A drunken dog brawl is really the last thing I need.
drunken bitches are the last thing anyone needs