Americans love dogs with a passion. We buy them gourmet food, tailor-made clothing and collars studded with semi-precious jewels. Perhaps our indulgent, over-the-top love for our canine friends stems from the fact that throughout history, we have benefited from the loyalty, bravery and companionship of our “best friend” and, as researchers now believe, our one-time source of food.
Man bites dog
Today people say say we live in a dog eat dog world, but 9000 plus years ago, people lived in a “man and woman eat dog” world, according to a new analysis of a bone fragment taken from a sample of human feces unearthed during a 1970s archeological site in the Lower Pecos region of Texas.
Samuel Belknap III
Researcher Samuel Belknap III, while investigating the diet and nutritional sources of ancient people of the Lower Pecos region, uncovered a small bone fragment in a sample of desiccated human waste. “It just so happens this person who lived 9,400 years ago was eating dog,” Belknap tells MSNBC.com.
Dogs bred for food?
Belknap continues, “Because it [the bone fragment] was found deep inside a pile of human excrement and was the characteristic orange-brown color that bone turns when it has passed through the digestive tract, the fragment provides the earliest direct evidence that dogs — besides being used for company, security and hunting — were eaten by humans and may even have been bred as a food source.”
DNA proof
According to the National Geographic article, “Domesticated Dog in Americas Found—Was Human Food,” researchers identified the bone fragment “as a piece of the right occipital condyle of a canine. Occiptal (sic) condyles are parts of vertebrate skulls where the skull meets the spine.” Genetic testing also confirmed that the bone came from a dog and not a wolf, coyote, or fox as some scientists had originally speculated.
Pug, Papillion or Pekingese?
According to Belknap’s research, the size of the bone fragment indicates the bone came from a small, 25 to 30 pound dog. Beloved breeds like Bichon Frise, Boston Terrier, Cavalier King Charles Spaniel, Dachshund, Havanese and Miniature Schnauzer are dogs that often weigh about 20-30 pounds and can give one an idea of the size of the ancient dogs that were being used as a food source.
The poop scoop
Although paleofecal analyst Belknap does not own a dog, he knows one when he sees one. When studying the ancient excrement sample that contained the dog skull fragment, he also discovered a small sesamoid bone that he believes is part of a dog foot, although it is too small of a sample for analysis.
Snoopy stew
Belknap believes that “dogs were butchered in a specific way and may have been cooked in a stew, which could explain how bones from a skull and wrist or ankle ended up in the same paleofecal sample.
“It could be that the smaller bones broke off in the butchering process and found their way into a stew or soup,” according to the article, “Student Finds Oldest Known Domesticated Dog in Americas.”
Friend or food?
Belknap continues, “Although it is known that dogs were also treated with the same kind of reverence with which we associate them today – domestic dogs have been found buried whole at sites from around the same era, which indicates they were held in some sort of regard – it is unknown whether this particular dog was viewed as a sort of pet, used as a form of security, or raised for a food source.”
