Snute is the name of the species of Royal Steeds used by the Knights of Daventry.
Background[]
They are a dog-like race..
The Bridge Trolls are known to eat both guards and snutes that cross them. Graham negotiated with the trolls and guards to stop this practice.
Snute breeding and snute polo are two hobbies popular with the species.
Snutes replaced horses in common idioms like 'hold your horses', where people instead say 'hold your snutes'. Another saying is 'I'll be there in two stomps of a snute's boot".
There are both domesticated and wild snutes in the world.
Physiology[]
Snutes are covered in long fur, often in dark brown and white patches. Snutes have paws at the end of their front legs, each paw includes three toes, each with a claw. The paws are covered by fur (horsefeathers) from the side, look vaguely like hooves unless examined closely. The back legs seem to actually end in hooves. They are able to bark or growl like dogs.
Behind the scenes[]
The name snute appears in the file names, and is mentioned at least seven times in the game. But the context of these references are easily missed.
As horses exist in the KQ universe: the idiom 'beating a dead horse' appears in KQ1 remake, and horses physically appear in KQ5 and KQ7 (in form of the magical flying horse Necromancer, but otherwise a standard black horse), a toy horse in KQ4 (compare to Rocking Snute toy in Chapter 2), mentions in the Shakespeare Book (KQ4), winged horses (KQ2 and KQ6), traditional unicorns (KQ4 and KQ8, see also Daventry's symbol of unicorn and a lion), a bottle shaped like Sun Tzu on a horse in KQ8 (and horses are mentioned elsewhere in the game), and are heavily used in the novels; and horses are actually mentioned through the saying "horsefeathers" (said by the Hobblepots), its not clear exactly why horses are not seen in Daventry in the new series. But it seems as if Snutes were added to make things a bit more fantastical, like Graham's use of a giant gerbil as his personal steed. A line in King's Quest 1 SCI suggests, and the novels heavily discuss horses being used in Daventry.
Some of the puns in chapter 2 refer to 'neigh-sayers' which would seem to suggest that 'horses' may exist as well as used for Royal Steeds.