Dog

                     

The history of Evaluation of Dogs        

  

                We pet them, play with them and even call them our best friend but do we really know anything about the history of dogs. Where did they come from and how did they get to where they are now?

There are those who believe that the history of dogs started with the wolf. Their claim is that dogs descended from wolves. Yet there are others who argue that dogs could never have descended from wolves. They ask, ‘How then could over 350 variety of dogs have descend from this one species?”

Wolves have remained the same anatomically over hundreds of years, and research has shown that the wolves DNA and that of the dog are almost identical. The skeleton of the wolf and the dog are similar as far as their components are concerned, but the difference can be seen in the length of a limbs and the shape of the skull.

This similarity in appearance is believed in some quarters to be as a result of cross breeding or possibly mutation. There are breeds around today that retain a strong relationship with the wolf in their appearance and other ways.

If we turn our attention to the behavior of both dogs and wolves we find that both animals turn in circles before they settle down, howl at the moon, and bury bones. Their gestation period is the same at sixty-three days, and their young are born and develop in similar ways.

The similarity between both animals is uncanny but the divergence of dogs makes it hard to totally accept their relationship with wolves.

Evidence has shown that dogs and man have existed together since prehistoric times. It is widely accepted that the domestication of dogs begun over 14000 years ago. As prehistoric man changed from gathering to hunting for food, it was at that time, it is believed, that man and dog began hunting together. About 8000-9000 years ago, the dog also became protector for the newly domesticated animals that man decided he needed for his purposes.

When man started to give greater importance to certain features and characteristics in dogs that’s when breeding started. Features like being heavy set meant that the dog could be a good guard dog, or long legs, which meant the dog, could pursue and catch prey. Because of this, many different types of dogs came about during the time of Egypt’s formation in 1570 B.C.

It was not long before dogs were being bred worldwide. In the history of dogs the Romans, the Europeans, the Greeks and even the peoples of the Far east were training dogs for various activities including, fighting, sport, to hunt and prize possessions.

The popularity of dogs grew during the 15th and 16th century and they became good pets and good workers. Soon it was seen as fashionable to have a dog and because of this dog breeding took off, and by the turn of the 19th century there were a lot of new breeds. In recent times it is estimated that there are over 350 different breeds of dogs.