We have...
in NZ, what are called Captain Cook pigs. Left originally as food for shipwrecked sailors they rapidly went wild and bred until they are now a pest. They are big hairy bristly beasts and definitely not domestic or domesticatable.
We hunt them regularly. The meat is excellent! You do not shoot them, because the pigs are usually in forestry plantations or on private land and no guns are allowed, you must use a knife to 'stick' them. Pig hunting is very close up and personal. Do mention the smell and the noise in your hunt. Wild pigs have a strong smell and they are hot with rage, you can smell the heat and singed bristles! What with the dogs baying and yipping and snarling and the pig grunting, squealing and roaring you can't hear yourself speak so your fellow hunters have to know exactly who is doing what and where.
So, Suse, from first hand experience, first you use a pack of pig dogs which have been carefully trained. They will get cut and hurt. We always carry a dog first aid pack for them. We don't use nets, a big pig, boar or sow, will go through a net like a hot knife through melted butter. Perhaps the nets used in your time period were for catching the smaller pigs as they ran away? Or were they just to hinder the pig a bit and slow him down?
The pigs are always in the bush. That is they live in heavily forested areas with thick undergrowth which is virtually impossible to get into or see through, and you must use the dogs to drive them out. People can't do it as a boar will kill with those tusks and a sow doesn't think twice about bowling you over, especially if she has piglets around. And they all bite, nasty bites which will turn septic on dogs and us.
So the dogs go in and rouse the pig. Well trained dogs go for the biggest pig and they run it until it turns at bay. The dogs then hold it at bay until the hunters arrive. You have to be very fit and move fast to keep up with the dogs as the quicker you are the less injured they are! These days we have special satellite tracking collars on the dogs which has cut down on dog injury as we know where they are at all times.
At the kill the knife man goes in from behind the pig whilst the dogs and hunting partner distract from the front. It's got to be timed just right and done very quickly. My son favours the: ‘onto back, grab ear, yank head up and round, slash throat’ approach. It's a bit heart stopping to watch and believe me that knife has to be large and sharp.
A seriously big boar needs the front man/men to feint for the head and chest, holding and manoeuvring to let the knife man go for the heart.
As Richard B says, chucking a spear or javelin from a distance isn't on in the usually forested surroundings and a pig at bay backs itself into any kind of shelter it can find so a killing shot from a distance isn't usually possible. And no, you wouldn't annoy a furious boar by hurling a few spears into it. In those circs the beast charges. In fact the job of the dogs is to stop the boar or sow going for the hunters. Pigs don't die quietly and gently, they fight all the way.
From my experience both those pictures are much too tame. The second is accurate as to the setting but anyone sticking a spear into a pig would be leaning into the job with full strength and the pig would be going for the hunter's throat!
I've located the hunting passage in Gawain too. I've actually got the poem, but never got round to reading it looks hard-going...
