It's long been believed that dog breeds like the Akita, Afghan Hound and Chinese Shar-Pei are among the most ancient canines, but apparently -- we'll never know the truth. A new study found that dogs have been cross-bred so many times over the years, it's impossible to accurately trace their origins.Researchers from Durham University said that our dogs might resemble those pictured in old texts and drawings, but so many changes have occurred in the thousands of years that have passed, that we can't accurately label any modern dog breeds as "ancient."
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Lead author Dr. Greger Larson explained, "Ironically, the ubiquity of dogs combined with their deep history has obscured their origins and made it difficult for us to know how dogs became man's best friend. All dogs have undergone significant amounts of cross-breeding to the point that we have not yet been able to trace all the way back to their very first ancestors."
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Larson also noted that although dogs have been domesticated for 15,000 years -- we've only keeping them as pets for about 2,000 years. And it's only very recently that they've become "real" pets -- rather than being used for specific jobs.
"Both the appearance and behavior of modern breeds would be deeply strange to our ancestors who lived just a few hundred years ago," Larson explained. "And so far, anyway, studying modern breeds hasn't yet allowed us to understand how, where and when dogs and humans first started this wonderful relationship."
