 Hunting with cheetahs became more prevalent toward the seventh century AD. In the Middle East, the cheetah would accompany the nobility to hunts in special seats behind saddles. Cheetahs continued to be associated with royalty and elegance in western Asia till as late as the 19th century. The first phase of taming would take several weeks, in which the cheetah would be kept tethered and made to get accustomed to human beings. Next, the cheetah would be tempted with food and trained to mount horses. Finally, its hunting instincts would be aroused by slaughtering animals before it. The whole process could take as long as a year to complete. In eastern Asia, the records are confusing as regional names for the leopard and the cheetah may be used interchangeably. The earliest depiction of cheetahs from eastern Asia dates back to the Tang dynasty (7th to 10th centuries AD); paintings depict tethered cheetahs as well as cheetahs mounted on horses. Chinese emperors would use cheetahs, as well as caracals, as gifts. In the 13th and the 14th centuries, the Yuan rulers bought numerous caracals, cheetahs, and tigers from the western parts of the empire and Muslim merchants in return for gold, silver, cash, and silk. According to the Ming Shilu, the subsequent Ming dynasty (14th to 17th centuries) continued this practice. The cheetah gradually entered Eurasia toward the 14th century, though they never became as popular as they had in the Middle East. The Mughal ruler Akbar the Great (1556 – 1605) is said to have kept as many as 1000 cheetahs. However, his son Jahangir wrote in his memoirs, Tuzk-e-Jahangiri, that only one of them gave birth to cubs. Mughal rulers trained cheetahs as well as caracals in a similar way as the West Asians, and used them to hunt game – especially blackbuck. The rampant hunting severely affected the populations of wild animals.
