In the later Stone Age the dog already occurs as the companion of man wherever it occurs in historic times. In Europe its remains have been found in the Danish kitchen-middens, in the northern Neolithic finds, in the lake-dwellings of Switzerland, in innumerable caves of the Neolithic Period, in the terramare of Upper Italy, etc. It was partly a comparatively small breed, according to Rütimeyer similar to the “wachtelhund” (setter) in size and build. Rütimeyer calls this breed the lake-dwelling dog, after the lake-dwellings, one of the chief places where it has been found. Like all breeds of animals of primitive domestication, the dog at this period, according to Nehring, is small—stunted, as it were. With the progress of civilisation the dog also grows larger.
Great Value of the Dog to Man
In the later prehistoric epochs, beginning with the so-called “Bronze” Period, we find throughout almost the whole of Europe a rather larger and more powerful breed with a more pointed snout—the Bronze dog—whose nearest relative seems to be the sheep-dog. At the present day the domestic dog is mostly employed for guarding settlements and herds and for hunting. In the Arctic regions the Esquimaux also use their dogs, which are like the sheep-dog, for personal protection and hunting; they do particularly good service against the musk-ox, while the wild reindeer is too fast for them. But the Esquimau dog is chiefly used for drawing the sledge, and, where the sledge cannot be used, as a beast of burden, since it is able to carry fairly heavy loads. In China and elsewhere, as formerly in the old civilised countries of South America, the dog is still fattened and killed for meat. So that the domestic dog serves every possible purpose to which domestic animals can be put, except, it seems, for milking, although this would not be out of the question either. The dog was also eaten by man in the later Stone Age, as is proved by the finds in his kitchen refuse. The reindeer is now restricted to the Polar regions of the Northern Hemisphere—Scandinavia, North Asia, and North America, whereas in the Palæolithic Period it was very numerous throughout Russia, Siberia, and temperate Europe down to the Alps and Pyrenees. It does not seem ever to have been definitely proved that the reindeer existed in the Neolithic Period of Central and Northern Europe, although according to Von Zittel it lived in Scotland down to the eleventh century and in the Hercynian forest until the time of Cæsar. The earliest definite information we appear to have of the tamed reindeer, which at the present day is a herd animal with the Lapps in Europe, and with the Samoyedes and Reindeer Tunguses in Asia, is found in Ælian, who speaks of the Scythians having tame deer.
Oxen at present exist nowhere in the wild state, while the tame ox is distributed as a domestic animal over the whole earth, and has formed the most various breeds. In the European Drift a wild ox, the urus, distinguished by its size and the size of its horns, was widely distributed, and it still lived during the later Stone Age with the domestic ox. In the later prehistoric ages, and even in historic times, the urus still occurs as a beast of the forest.
The Taming of the Wild Horse
In the later Stone Age the horse, too, is no longer merely a beast of the chase, but occurs also in the tame state. During the Drift the horse lived in herds all over Europe, North Asia, and North Africa. From this Drift horse comes the domestic horse now found all over the earth. Even the wild horses of the Drift exhibit such considerable differences from one another that, according to Nehring’s studies, these are to be regarded as the beginning of the formation of local breeds. The taming and domestication of the wild horse of the Drift, which began in the Stone Age, led to the domestic horse being split up later into numerous breeds. The old wild horse was comparatively small, with a large head; a similar form is still found here and there on the extensive barren moors of South Germany in the moss-horse, or, as the common people call it, the moss-cat. At the present day the genus of the domestic horse falls, like the ox, into two chief breeds—a smaller and more graceful Oriental breed, and a more powerful and somewhat larger Western breed with the facial bones more strongly developed. The horse of the later Stone Age of Europe exhibits only comparatively slight differences from the wild horse; it is generally a small, half-pony-like form with a large head, evidently also a stunted product of primitive breeding under comparatively unfavourable conditions. Two species extant in the Stone Age still live wild on the steppes of Central Asia at the present day; one of them also occurs as a fossil in the European Drift, although only rarely. That the ass occurred in the European Drift is probable, but not proved. It has not yet been found in the Neolithic Period of Europe.
Did the Horse come from Asia?
A survey of the palæontology of the domestic animals shows that they come from wild Drift species which—at any rate, as regards the ox, horse, and dog—are now extinct, so that these most important domestic animals now exist only in the tame state. Some of the domestic animals came from Asia, and, according to Von Zittel, were imported into Europe from there; this applies to the peat-ox and the domestic goat and pig. The Asiatic origin of the domestic horse and sheep is probable, but not proved; the sheep is found wild in South Europe as well as in Asia. The tarpan, a breed of horse very similar to the wild horse, lives in herds independent of man on the steppes of Central Asia. This has been indicated as being probably the parent breed of the domestic horse, and the origin of the latter has accordingly also been traced to Asia.
One thing is certain: a considerable number of animal forms that co-exist with man in Europe at the present day—for instance, almost all the forms of our poultry and the fine kinds of pigs and sheep—have originally come from Asia. Our investigations show a similar state of things even in the Neolithic Period.