Page 40 - THE SLOUGHI REVIEW - ISSUE 13

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As we also see here, the question of domestication, of becoming a domestic animal, is not
as easy to answer as we generally imagine. Starting with the semi-wild Bubalus cattle.
How do we have to imagine it? Do the cattle, like the reindeer, mostly run free through
the countryside? Do they mate freely, i.e. not purposefully, and are therefore not
domesticated? Or have we already reached the following stage here, that the short-term

situation controlled by humans occurs in a more permanent form? Would this mean
anything for the type of mating, whether natural or selective? Camels are also
temporarily tied by their forelegs at night, that is, their forelegs are tied together loosely
enough so that they can still walk, but not too far.

Does a deliberate mating by humans take place? Or is it not rather a natural mating
within a herd, even if man exercises a certain control over the herd? But whether the

herd is also protected, perhaps even with the help of dogs, we will see below.

Wikipedia quotes the assumption that the early bone finds of dogs would have been
sighthounds. This is very speculative and it is not likely that it was a sighthound type as
we imagine it today. The Tesem, in any case, was obviously not a sighthound type, as we
will see below.

Thus, even Darwin's account of the “descent of species” cannot easily be represented by a
modern idea of racial formation and descent. Darwin also speaks of “natural selection”
or choice, not directed selection. Especially as it is conceded that domestication could
well have happened at several places in the world more or less at the same time. This
makes the origin from a single ancestor, for example the wild wolf, entirely speculative!
And the lack of differentiation and attribution to one or more wolf species is still owed by

science.

-Africanis: The dog reaches Africa

Up to now, one always refers the origin of the dog to the wolf as the ancestor. This is also
true for the African dogs. As we will see below, there are several canid ancestors that

come into question for the Basenji-Azawakh-Sloughi ancestry. Eastern ancestors, but also
ancestors to which the Syrian wolf is closely related, play a role.

This thesis is supported by science which, with the help of genetics, nevertheless proves
a few indications of several possible ancestors of different lineages of dogs. The studies
by Bergström and Skoglund and their colleagues suggest that an immigration of dogs with
humans from the Levant took place about 7,000 years ago. However, as Bergström

delineates, although this population was replaced from what was then Persia, intermixing
with the population that migrated to Africa did not occur until the 19th century. More on
this below.