248 DELIBERATE INTRODUCTION OF NEW ANIMALS 



It is not represented in the remains of the Roman settle- 

 ments at Newstead on the Tweed, nor at Inveresk near 

 Musselburgh, and the single jaw of a young individual which 

 I examined from Traprain Law in Haddingtonshire, was 

 almost certainly recent, for burrows penetrated Ihe kitchen- 

 midden in all directions. 



There are no pre- Norman allusions to the Rabbit in 

 Britain; it has no native name in the English or Celtic 

 languages; and warrens are not mentioned in Domesday 

 Book. We are therefore justified in assuming that it did not 

 occur, at any rate as a wild animal, in Britain even in the 

 eleventh century. 



The earliest name by which it is known in English histori- 

 cal records is "cony " or "coney," a name clearly derived from 

 a Norman-French word, the plural of which was "coniz" or 

 "conis," becoming in English "conys" or "conies, "and in the 

 singular "cony" and "conic." It seems probable then that 

 we are indebted for the introduction of the Rabbit to the 

 Norman Conquest a supposition strengthened by the fre- 

 quent and steadily increasing references to the animal after 

 the twelfth century. 



The sole object of its introduction was utility, since at 

 no time has the Rabbit been considered worthy the lance 

 of the true sportsman; for, said the irreproachable author 

 of The Master of Game (MS. Bodl. 546) in the fifteenth 

 century, "Of conies I do not speak, for no man hunteth 

 them unless it be bish hunters [fur hunters] and they hunt 

 them with ferrets and with long small hayes [i.e. nets]." Not- 

 withstanding The Master of Game, Bishop Leslie tells us 

 that in sixteenth century Scotland Rabbits and Hares were 

 hunted by special dogs. But if their sporting qualities were 

 limited, the value of their flesh for food and their skins for 

 fur was apparent, and these first led to their encouragement 

 and rapid dispersal. As Reyce put it in 1 6 1 8 in The Breviary 

 of Suffolk: 



Of the harmlesse Conies, which do delight naturally to make their aboad 

 here,... their great increase, with rich profitt for all good housekeepers, hath 

 made every one of any reckoning to prepare fitt harbour for them, with 

 great welcome and entertainment. 



An excellent summary of the history of the Rabbit in 

 England, will be found in Barrett- Hamilton and Hinton's 



