Page 81 - THE SLOUGHI REVIEW - ISSUE 13

T H E S L O U G H I R E V I E W 8 1

In Arrian we find how these hunts, which were supposed to be more like a competition,
went on. Arrian was concerned with the competition to see who was the faster runner,
the hare or the sighthound. He writes [60]:

“He who has good bitches should not untie them close to the hare, nor more than two at a
time ... For the right huntsmen lead the bitches on the hunt, not to catch the game, but to

fight and compete in the run; ... When the bitch has caught the hare or has otherwise beaten
it in the run, one must get off the horse and praise it with songs of praise, stroke it kindly
over the head, tickle the ears and call it by name ... All Celts who are rich and lead a noble

life practice hunting ... they push the hare and put it on horseback after ..... Those who hunt
more on their own go out on foot; on horseback they are followed by a single man whose task
it is to pursue with the bitches at the same time. They search the area by forming a line and
then proceeding straight ahead; ... But the bitches, if they have several with them, must not
go along haphazardly in the line, ... Rather, a leader of the hunt must be set up, and he pairs

off the bitches and gives the instruction: If this one gets up, you and you have to untie, but
no other may untie; if there, again you and you.

The Celts also hunt in such a way that they add sighthounds to the Bracken, and while one
of them is searching the field, they stand with the good bitches on their hands in the spaces
where the hare is expected to take its pass, so that they can untie the bitches at the right
moment. These bitches are, what to Xenophon the nets were to him.”

When we look at Arrian's description of hunting with hounds, we find the same

description of hunting as we saw at the very beginning with Sloughis, with and without
Bracken in appropriate terrain. But we also find the hunt with the Galgos Españoles again:
the single rider, the handlers with the paddocks and so on (see Sloughi Review No.9), or
as it is depicted in the North African mosaics, for example by El Jem.

But we also see that the regulated form of hunting, as practised by the Greeks and
Romans, is not practised in North Africa. In North Africa today, people go out with one or
more hounds, completely unorganised and not, as described by the Greeks and Romans,
just two hounds that are let loose when the game, the hare, is already running!