Hart (deer)

"Hunting the Hart", a picture from George Turberville, copied from La Venerie de Jaques du Fouilloux, 16th century

A hart is a male red deer, synonymous with stag and used in contrast to the female hind; its use may now be considered mostly poetic or archaic. The word comes from Middle English hert, from Old English heorot; compare Frisian hart, Dutch hert, German Hirsch, and Swedish, Norwegian, and Danish hjort, all meaning "deer". Heorot is given as the name of Hrothgar's mead hall in the Old English epic Beowulf.

Historically, hart has also been used generically to mean "deer, antelope", as in the royal antelope, which Willem Bosman called "the king of the harts".[1] The word hart was also sometimes used in the past specifically to describe a stag of more than five years.

  1. ^ Beddard, F.E. (2015). The Cambridge Natural History, Vol X. Mammalia. The Library of Alexandria. ISBN 978-1-5115-9533-9.