To what extent has the dog changed since its domestication, how and why has it been altered, and are the modifications what we think they are? The answers suggested in a new research paper are startling, especially since we have had thousands or even tens of thousands of years to wreak our will on the dog. Evidence for a sapiens-canid relationship in deep antiquity is legion. How ancient is the relationship? Dogs were the first animals domesticated, if we leave lice out of it .
Dogs were by our side before the dawn of civilization as we know it. The process of domesticating the dog, which preceded that of any other animal (that we wanted) from one or more species of wolf in prehistoric Eurasia, began more than 15,000 years ago and possibly double that or more. Indirect evidence suggests a Siberian origin 23,000 years ago.
Some genetic research suggests divergence between the wolf and dog possibly as much as 40,000 years ago. Direct evidence of prehistoric canines appear among the Natufians in the Levant at least 12,000 years ago and in Germany even earlier. Desert nomads in Jordan were living and hunting with dogs 11,500 years ago.
Yet another study, on ancient canines in Alaska about 10,000 years ago, concluded that relationships were being forged between the early colonizers of the Americas and different canine species, indicating that the domestication process of the dog was more complicated than man-fed-wolf. Moving onto biblical times, maybe we began to take them for gra.
