Wild dog-like animals found in Africa, Asia, and the Middle East that hunt in packs and eat meat.
From Persian 'šagāl' and Sanskrit 'śṛgāla,' the word traveled through Turkish and Arabic into European languages. The animal was known to Middle Eastern and Asian peoples long before European naturalists named it scientifically.
Jackals were so common around ancient Middle Eastern settlements that they appear in biblical texts and Aesop's Fables—they're basically the original 'pest' animal that humans have dealt with for thousands of years, yet we still romanticize them today.
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