1171: Terms of Venery Feb 22, 2018

Names for groups of animals such as 'murder of crows', 'pod of whales', or 'tower of giraffes' are called 'terms of venery'; as the name suggests, they were originally when hunting (compare with 'venison'). Many of the names may sound silly to people now, and not unreasonably; there is no reason to memorize all of them, so in practical use people will opt for 'herd' or 'group' rather than saying other specific words, with a few exceptions for more common animals. It may seem that this is because we have less of a need to discuss animals nowadays, as few people need to hunt and farm than in the past, but before the 11th century, and in some ways even before the 14th century, nobody used terms of venery much anyway either. Considering that there would not have developed a hunting culture around, for instance, wombats (for whom a group is a 'wisdom') in England and France where these terms began, it should be reasonable that these terms developed more as a fashion and less as practical terminology. Indeed, terms of venery were only supposed to be as a linguistic mark of higher status originally, but after several books in the 15th and 16th centuries were published with these names, people kept making them up for fun, as people continue to do now.

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