Meet the Beagle

Our history is long and it’s surrounded by mystery. Historians can’t even agree on how we got our name! Some historians believe our name is derived from the Gaelic word “beag” which means “little.” Others think it comes from the French word for the sound that hounds make while they hunt: “be’geule.”

Greek documents from as early as 400 B.C. describe dogs similar to Beagles and small packs of these scenthounds are reported to have hunted rabbits and hares in England before the Romans arrived in 55 B.C. We became popular in England really early, like during the 1300s. Teeny-tiny dogs called Glove Beagles were extremely popular because they were small enough to fit in one hand! Early reports also mention Singing Beagles, named after our beautiful, melodic howls, called “baying.” Elizabeth I famously kept packs of Pocket Beagles, which were only nine inches tall! Some of them are even in her portraits.

By the 1500s, the majority of English gentlemen either owned packs of large foxhounds that tracked deer or smaller hounds used for rabbit hunting. These smaller hunting hounds were our ancestors! The main draw to us Beagles compared to larger hunting dogs was that humans could keep up with us on foot and didn’t have to ride alongside us on horseback. We became a cheaper and more accessible option for hunters in England and eventually the United States.

Around the 1800s, American breeders started importing us in an effort to improve the looks of their own dogs. Who could blame them? We are pretty gorgeous. We were immediately embraced by rabbit hunters for our speed and hunting abilities. A man named Willet Randall developed a line of us called Patch Beagles in New York in 1880. Patch Beagles were in high demand because we could run so fast.

The first Beagle was registered by the American Kennel Club in 1885; his name was Blunder. The National Beagle Club was founded two years later in 1887.

In the years since we came to America, we’ve gone from hunting wild animals to becoming furever family members in households all over the country. The AKC even named us the fourth best family dog in 2019!