Who let the dogs in? Lap dogs, canid sacrifices and funerary practices in the Roman cemetery of Llanos del Pretorio (Cordoba, Spain)

Abstract

Small dogs as pets, objects of affection and special consideration by their owners, are known in the Western Mediterranean since classical Antiquity through texts, epigraphy and iconography. The study of a small-sized canid with a brachycephalic skull discovered in a cemetery, among other specimens, in the southern Hispania yields new interpretations regarding the relationships between dogs and humans at the outset of the Common Era in the western Roman world and sheds light on how to evaluate their symbolic implications in funerary rites. The physical characteristics of these specimens were analysed through morphological, osteometric, palaeopathological and biochemical isotopes methods. The findings represent a step forward in the understanding of the everyday life, mobility and diet of dogs, as well as the cause of their death which, in the case of the small-sized specimen, appears to correspond to a deliberate sacrifice.

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ORIGINAL PAPER
Who let the dogs in? Lap dogs, canid sacrifices and funerary practices
in the Roman cemetery of Llanos del Pretorio (Cordoba, Spain)
Rafael M Martínez Sánchez
1
&Manuel Rubio Valverde
2
&Marta Moreno-García
3
&Alexis Maldonado Ruiz
1
&
Arsenio Granados Torres
4
&Antonio Delgado Huertas
4
Received: 11 November 2019 /Accepted: 17 February 2020
#Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature 2020
Abstract
Small dogs as pets, objects of affection and special consideration by their owners, are known in the Western
Mediterranean since classical Antiquity through texts, epigraphy and iconography. The study of a small-sized canid
with a brachycephalic skull discovered in a cemetery, among other specimens, in the southern Hispania yields new
interpretations regarding the relationships between dogs and humans at the outset of the Common Era in the western
Roman world and sheds light on how to evaluate their symbolic implications in funerary rites. The physical
characteristics of these specimens were analysed through morphological, osteometric, palaeopathological and bio-
chemical isotopes methods. The findings represent a step forward in the understanding of the everyday life, mobility
and diet of dogs, as well as the cause of their death which, in the case of the small-sized specimen, appears to
correspond to a deliberate sacrifice.
Keywords Roman dogs .Funerary practices .Southern Iberia .Animal sacrifice .Stable isotopes
Introduction
The relationship between dogs and humans is not only the
first, but the most exceptional, compelling and emotional
narrative of animal domestication. The earliest traces of
dogs in the Iberian Peninsula date to the end of the Upper
Pleistocene (Altuna 1994). Their presence multiplies in the
Neolithic (Detry and Cardoso 2010), a time frame with the
earliest cases in funerary contexts (Moreno-García 2003;
Albizuri et al. 2019). It is in the subsequent Copper Age
that their occurrence in the archaeological record begins to
be abundant enough to draw conclusions as to morphology
and dimensions. Although the data indicate slightly small-
er specimens, most are well-proportioned, with a balanced
appearance, an eumetric morphology, and a relatively ho-
mogeneous, medium size at a withers height of about
0.50 m (Daza 2017). Dogs in funerary contexts are also
very frequent throughout the Copper and Bronze Ages. In
the latter of the two periods, there are also traces that they
served for draught, and on some occasions, for consump-
tion (Grandal-d’Anglade et al. 2019).
Important changes in dog morphology took place in the
Iron Age with an expansion of difference between larger
and smaller dogs. Dogs maintained nonetheless their place
*Rafael M Martínez Sánchez
rmmartinez@ugr.es
Marta Moreno-García
marta.moreno@cchs.csic.es
Alexis Maldonado Ruiz
amaru@ugr.es
Arsenio Granados Torres
arseniog@iact.ugr-csic.es
Antonio Delgado Huertas
antonio.delgado@csic.es
1
Department of Prehistory and Archaeology, University of Granada,
Granada, Spain
2
Cordoba, Spain
3
Institute of History, Spanish National Research Council,
Madrid, Spain
4
Andalusian Institute of Earth Sciences, CSIC-University of Granada,
Granada, Spain
Archaeological and Anthropological Sciences (2020) 12:87
https://doi.org/10.1007/s12520-020-01033-1
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