Somewhere – perhaps in the Fertile Crescent of Mesopotamia, perhaps in China – people first discovered that this king of the sky could be tamed to work. A bird that had once been revered as a god became the aerial weapon of hunters and falconry, the sport of hunting with a falcon, was born. Arabs may have been the earliest falconers, according to falconry historians. Old texts tell of Arabian falconers setting out with three or more falcons to pounce on the swift gazelle.

Most historians credit the Crusaders with bringing falconry to England and making it popular in the royal court. Kings saw the falcon as a symbol of savage efficiency because like the monarch, the falcon was merciless and above all law. Consequently, England's monarchs passed laws that kept the sport exclusively for nobles.

To put the falcon's deadly skill under human control, nobles recruited falconers who took birds from the wild and trained them to hunt for royal masters. A falconer in medieval Europe trained either an "eyas" (a chick taken from the nest) or a "haggard" (a full grown wild falcon). An eyas was easier to train than a haggard, but a haggard's style and dash appealed to falconers.