Alan Davidson

Rock-Rabbit

Appears in
Oxford Companion to Food
Oxford Companion to Food

By Alan Davidson

Published 2014

  • About

rock-rabbit Procavia capensis, a small rabbit-sized animal of the Middle East and Arabia and most of sub-Saharan Africa. Surprisingly, it is more closely related to the elephant than to the rabbit. Another name for it and close relations is hyrax. One of these close relations is probably the ‘coney’ of the Bible.

These small animals constitute a minor food resource in most countries in their range. They feed on a healthy diet of fruit and leaves which must be responsible for one feature of them, which is that their excrement contains a substance used in perfumery (although not, so far as can be discovered, traceable in the flavour of their meat).