Review of Mark Derr's new book How The Dog Became The Dog: From Wolves To Our Best Friends
"When did the strange relationship between humans and dogs begin? According to journalist Mark Derr in How the Dog Became the Dog, prehistoric wolves had an inner pet just waiting to be drawn out by the right kind of human. Contrary to the popular notion that dogs are the descendants of trash-grubbing wolves that were friendly or naive enough to strike up an association with ancient people, Derr contends that wolves and Pleistocene Homo sapiens struck up a mutually beneficial relationship as soon as the two species met in prehistoric Eurasia.
The difference between wolf and dog doesn't seem so much anatomical or genetic as the result of a change in status that came with domestication, and that hasn't been preserved in the fossil record. Derr tries to fill in some of the substantial gaps with fictional passages of people and their canid companions through history, but these momentary distractions from what is unknown just serve to confound the book's central question. Derr's wandering, circuitous story of dog origins only highlights how much we have yet to learn about our curious relationship with the domesticated, carnivorous beasts we have invited into our homes."
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