![]() ![]() Tracing genetic mutation rates in these genomes yielded the new date estimates. Veeramah, of Stony Brook University, and colleagues sampled DNA from two Neolithic German dog fossils, 7,000 and 4,700 years old respectively. ![]() Last summer, research reported in Nature Communications pushed likely dates for domestication further back into the past, suggesting that dogs were domesticated just once at least 20,000 but likely closer to 40,000 years ago. Scientists cannot agree on the timing, either. Genetic studies have pinpointed everywhere from southern China to Mongolia to Europe. ‘The domestication of dogs was one of the most extraordinary events in human history,” Hare says.īut controversies abound concerning where a long-feared animal first became our closest domestic partner. There’s general scientific agreement on that point, and also with evolutionary anthropologist Brian Hare’s characterization of what happened next. Gray wolves and dogs diverged from an extinct wolf species some 15,000 to 40,000 years ago. Pugs and poodles may not look the part, but if you trace their lineages far enough back in time all dogs are descended from wolves. But beyond the theater the true story is slowly taking shape, as scientists explore the real origins of our oldest domestic relationship and learn how both species have changed along canines’ evolutionary journey from wolves to dogs. We’ll never know the gritty details of how humans and dogs first began to come together. Just how many nuggets of fact might be sprinkled throughout this prehistoric fiction? Fighting to survive, he forgoes killing an injured wolf and instead befriends the animal, forging an unlikely partnership that-according to the film-launches our long and intimate bond with dogs. The new drama Alpha answers that question with a Hollywood "tail" of the very first human/dog partnership.Įurope is a cold and dangerous place 20,000 years ago when the film’s hero, a young hunter named Keda, is injured and left for dead. So how did this relationship change? How did dogs go from being our bitter rivals to our snuggly, fluffy pooch pals? Long ago, before your four-legged best friend learned to fetch tennis balls or watch football from the couch, his ancestors were purely wild animals in competition-sometimes violent-with our own. ![]()
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