The Armour Archive

We knocked this about in chat tonight, I thought it was a good topic for a broader audience.

What do you know about dogs in [your chosen] period? Would you own them? How many? For what purpose? Is that breed still with us today, and is it still bred true-to-purpose or stylized to modern "tastes"?

From brass effigies of my period (Early 14th), a long bodied, small dog, with a kind of snub nose, is popular, and a lean hound dog, which looks a little like an italian greyhound. I have seen other sources which show a larger, more mastiff style dog, which may have been used for hunting.

I havent had a pet for nearly 3 years now. I have been considering getting a greyhound as a pet, but ive been told that they will chase anything that moves, even across a busy road. So a mastiff might be a little better, and maybe protect my house too, just by looking mean.

The Norweigan Elkhound and the Danish Birdhound are almost unchanged from the breeds during the Viking age. I had a chance to buy a pair of male Elkhound puppies, they were $175 each, I tried to buy one and have my mom pitch in for the other, but she refused . Beautiful lil' guys.

Think twice about the mastiff please,, realize how big they get and that they are short lived, as are all the giant breeds,,

I had one, a saxon mastiff, who put on ten pounds aweeks growing up till he wieghed abot 160 at year,, all muscle no fat. He was my little man as I had him since 5 weeks old and he wieghed just about 5 lbs then,,

He had to be put to sleep aas he developed a brain tumor at 20 months that was causing very irrational behavior,,

But the big breeds, mastiffs, danes etc only live about 8 years or so,, where as the toy breeds live forever it seems

I have only passing knowledge of dog breeds since my parents were firm believers in not buying a dog when there's so many pups that can be gotten for free.

Well, maybe not "so many" but there's always a litter of mutts somewhere that need homes.

Anyway, to the point.

I believe that the komondor breed is one of the oldest pure-breed. Sheep dog. 125 to 150 pounds or so, and one of the few purebreed large dogs to not display any genetic tendancies for illnesses or conditions.

Not a dog that would be following a noble around though. You sent this one out with your flock while you did something else.

The concept of "breed", as we use the term today, is actually not very meaningful when speaking about medieval dogs. A medieval breeder would not have hesitated to breed in dogs of other types to get his desired ends, more like breeding lurchers and longdogs today. When you look at pictures of medieval greyhounds, for example, in this painting:

http://www.bnf.fr/enluminures/images/jpeg/i5_0020.jpg

You see a fair variation in size and coat among the greyhounds pictured there. I think the term "type" is really more applicable.

In this picture:

http://www.bnf.fr/enluminures/images/jpeg/i5_0017.jpg

we see a pretty representative sample of the hunting hounds of the later middle ages. There are wire- and short-haired greyhounds, lymers (the largish scenthound in the upper right-hand corner), alaunts (lower left-hand corner), raches or running hounds (bottom center), and mastiffs (the shaggy beasts with spiked collars on the right side; note that they don't look very much like what we today think of as mastiffs). In addition, Gaston also shows spaniels (they can be seen here:
http://www.bnf.fr/enluminures/images/jpeg/i5_0022.jpg )

While some dogs seem to have been beloved by their owners, there seems little sense of dogs as purely "pets" until the lap dog came about. Someone once told me these were bred to warm the laps of women with menstrual cramps, although I have no way of knowing if that's true.

Each type of dog or hound had its specific function and purpose: The greyhound was intended to course game (including deer and hare) and to kill it; the lymer was intended to locate a hart in the wild (they were always used on leash; in fact the name "lymer" derives from "liam", a word for leash); the spaniel was used for flushing birds, the rache or running hound, ancestor to most modern scenthound breeds, was used in packs to chase game such as deer; the alaunt, a powerful but fast type now sadly extinct was used to hunt powerful and dangerous game such as bear and boar; and the mastiff was used to protect the home and, to a lesser extent, for general hunting (Gaston gives several examples of how they were hunted, but when doing so a mastiff cross was mostly used, although he says he doesn't wish to dwell on this 'for there is no great mastery nor great profit in the hunting these hounds engage in').

PS: This list isn't meant to be entirely inclusive: For example, there were different types of herding dogs, etc., about which I know nothing. This list was only meant to apply to a Western European nobleman.

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Hugh Knight
"Welcome to the Church of the Open Field, let us 'prey': Hunt hard, kill swiftly, waste nothing, make no apologies"

[This message has been edited by SyrRhys (edited 05-17-2002).]

What do you guys have against the flying Chihuahua's anyways???

::ducking and running for cover::

Bran

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Courage is not the absence of fear, it's the ability to overcome it.

[This message has been edited by Bran Mac Scandlan (edited 05-17-2002).]

Remember dogs were also regional.

A Shepard dog from England, might be what we'd tink of as a English Sheepdog, big and wolly.

A German sheep dog, would be more like a modern Geraman Sheppard.

They were also somewhat class and job spacific.

Rotts for ex are very very old, used as light draft animals and cattle herders from antiquity. They pulled butcher carts in Germany, i've read that the name means "Red wheeler" from the bloody carts. Many of them came from a spacific area in Germany which now is called Rottwhile according to my lil German wife. Supposedly bred down to current size from Roman Mavasta (sp?) left there by the legions.

They are closely related to the Swiss mountain dog and Berenes mountain dogs, which are also cart dogs.

Mastiffs are wonderful types of dogs. (Rotts are a mastiff type) They are big gragerous loving dogs, very smart and will lie down and die for those they love. I only wish they lived longer.

They are big sweet dogs that leave a big hole in your life when they die.

Originally posted by SyrRhys:
The concept of "breed", as we use the term today, is actually not very meaningful when speaking about medieval dogs. A medieval breeder would not have hesitated to breed in dogs of other types to get his desired ends, more like breeding lurchers and longdogs today.

Yup, dog people call this phenotype. Most dog "Breeds" were created in the last 2 centuries where Western afficionados started tracking pedigrees and developing standards.


<B>and mastiffs (the shaggy beasts with spiked collars on the right side; note that they don't look very much like what we today think of as mastiffs). In addition, Gaston also shows spaniels (they can be seen here:
http://www.bnf.fr/enluminures/images/jpeg/i5_0022.jpg )</B>

The mastiff type dogs were used for various things, flockguards, personal guards, war dogs, and hunting. The type of dogs shown in that picture are more closely resembling some of the flockguardian types like the Spanish Mastiff, Anatolian, Akbash, Maremma, Slovac Kuvasc, etc.

I've never seen a period mastiff depiction that looked like the modern "English Mastiff", they tend to be both long and short haired, have a somewhat curled tail, floppy ears and do not have the pushed in muzzle some of the modern mastiff breeds have. Most of the Flockguardian dogs fit the period "mastiff" type better.

<B>
While some dogs seem to have been beloved by their owners, there seems little sense of dogs as purely "pets" until the lap dog came about. </B>

I'm not sure when that came about, but there are lapdogs and tiny dogs being carried by campfollowers shown in woodcuts by the turn of the 16th c. But there are a lot of obvious medium sized spaniel type mutts shown too.

I do recall some dogs depicted in hunting pictures that look just like Weimereiners. Some of the various pointer and spaniel phenotypes are also represented.

Juliana

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR><font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">Originally posted by ironmongermisc:
Think twice about the mastiff please,, realize how big they get and that they are short lived, as are all the giant breeds,</font><HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Many of the giant rare breeds are still fairly long lived. We chose Anatolian Shepherd dogs because they fit the period "mastiff" look, were pretty much not "ruined" yet, and had an 11-14 yr life span. We have a bitch now, but our stud was hit by a car last May. He was 32" at the shoulder and ranged between 125-140 lbs. He was a very average sized male for the breed. I met one who was 175 and 36" at the shoulder. He was exceptionally large. Our female is petite for the breed and is 90-95 lbs or so.

Many of the giant rare breeds are still quite primative and sometimes quite dominant, definitely not for everyone. Most of the rarer flockguardian breeds can be extremely dog aggressive for instance.

Juliana

My wife and I are considering getting a Schnauzer, and I just discovered the other day that they're an older breed than I thought. Dürer and Rembrandt both featured them in some of their artwork.

Here is a nice dog picture (French, 13th c):

http://www.humanities-interactive.org/medieval/songglory/ex071_14b.html

Here in Sweden we by tradition have a number of Spitz-breads. Most of them are VERY old in type (archaeological finds point towards the Stone Age).
[img]http://www.skk.se/bilder/vastgota.gif[/img]

This is a Västgötaspets, it is traditionally used for hearding and guard-keeping. Finds in Viking Age context here in Sweden show dogs simmular to this breed.
You'll find Spitz breeds in the other Nordic coutries as well

/Ny Björn

Ha Ha,
it should be Spitz BREEDS , even though the Västgötaspets has a slight resemblance to a loaf of bread ( )

/Ny Björn

My personal favourite "period dog" has been mentioned already, under another name...

The Vallhund

http://www.vikinganswerlady.org/graphics/vallhund.gif

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<I><B>"Wulfgar spake, the Wendles' chieftain,
whose might of mind to many was known..."</I></B>

Wulfgar Ullicsson inn Gerpir

Actually, here you go, try this link.

http://www.vikinganswerlady.org/vik_pets.htm



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<I><B>"Wulfgar spake, the Wendles' chieftain,
whose might of mind to many was known..."</I></B>

Wulfgar Ullicsson inn Gerpir

Wulfgar, you probably know this already, but 'vallhund' translates as 'herd dog' and the good Answerlady got it somewhat wrong for once. The breed's name IS Västgötaspets. A Vallhund can be any breed used to herd sheep or cattle (collies etc).

They ARE nice though, they just tend to bark a little too often...

/Ny Björn

I’ve got one of the coolest dogs in the world. He’s an Irish Water Spaniel. Not that I was concerned with the history of the breed, but they are mention specifically by name in Two Gentlemen of Verona, Act 3 Scene 1, "She hath more qualities than a water-spaniel; which is much in a bare Christian." As well as in a book printed in 1607 called "Historie of the Foure-tooted Beastes", which describes and illustrates the "Water Spagnel" (though I’ve never seen it.


Works and behaves like a lab without the shedding problems. “Dog expertsâ€

Were Chihuahua's "period" dogs who came over with the conquistadors and got loose in the Chihuahuan desert (sort of like horses) or are they an import from the New World?

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Quid Corone

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR><font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">Originally posted by edward atte flynt:
<B>Were Chihuahua's "period" dogs who came over with the conquistadors and got loose in the Chihuahuan desert (sort of like horses) or are they an import from the New World?

</B></font><HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

..and he spake "let slip the chihuahuas of war"