Terms of venery (words for groups of animals)

The tradition of using collective nouns that are specific to certain kinds of animals stems from an English hunting tradition, dating back to at least the 15th century, in which poetic names were given to specific kinds of prey ("venery" means the hunting of animals). For this reason, there are many collective nouns that refer to animals and many of these original collective nouns are archaic: a "harras of horses" seems to have been used little since the 1400s. Some alternatives for collective nouns can be clearly traced to the evolution of pronunciation in different areas (hence a "parcel of hogs" and a "passel of hogs").

Sometimes a term of venery will apply to a group only in a certain context. "Herd" can properly refer to a group of wild horses, but not to a group of domestic horses. A "paddling of ducks" only refers to ducks on water.

Interest in constituent-object-specific collective nouns has always remained high, and the coining of candidate collective nouns has been a pastime (usually humorous) of many writers ever since, including for non-animal nouns, such as professions, e.g., a "sequitur of logicians".