Gifford and William Twety, who lived in the reign of Edward II., composed a book on the craft of hunting, part in verse and part in prose, and among the beasts mentioned in those hunted we find—
"To venery I cast me fyrst to go;
Of whiche foure beasts there be; that is to say,
The hare, the herte, the wulfhe the wild boor also."
In the time of Charles I. they had evidently been long extinct, for he endeavored to reintroduce them, and was at considerable expense in order to procure a wild boar and his mate from Germany. These are said to have been turned into the New Forest, where they propagated greatly. The breed commonly called "forest pigs," have many of the characteristics of the wild boar.
Throughout the whole of England, the boar's head was formerly a standard Christmas dish, served with many ceremonies, and ushered in by an ancient chorus chanted by all present, the words of which are preserved in " Ritson's Ancient Song:—
"The bore's heed in hand bring I,
With "garlands" gay and rosemary,
I pray you all synge merily,
Qui estis in convivio.
The bore's heed, I understande,
Is the "chefe" servyce in the lande
Loke where ever it be founde,
Servite cum cantico.
Be gladde, lordes, bothe more and lasse,
For this hath ordeyned our stewarde,
To chere you all this Christmasse,
The bore's heed with mustarde.'
Queen Margaret, wife of James IV. of Scotland, "at the first course of her wedding dinner," was served with a "wyld bore's head gylt within a fayr platter."
King Henry II. himself bore this ancient dish into the hall, attended with trumpeters and great ceremony, when his son was crowned.
The boar's head is to the present day placed upon the table of the Queen's College, Oxford, on Christmas day, but now it is neatly carved in wood instead of being the actual head of the animal. This ceremony is said to have originated in a tabender belonging to that college having slain a wild boar on Christmas-day, which had long infested the neighborhood of Oxford.
The abbot of St. Germain, in Yorkshire, was bound to send yearly a present of a boar's head to the hangman, which a monk was obliged to carry on his own. This rent was paid yearly, at the feast of St. Vincent, the patron of the Benedictines, and on that day the executioner took precedency in the procession of monks.
