there are more dog burials in prehistory
than there are burials of any other
animals including cats for example or
horses dogs seem to have a very special
place in human communities in the past
as soon as we see in the archaeological
record skeletal remains that look like a
modern dog we see dogs being buried I
mean 14,000 years ago we see the first
dog burials appear I started about 12 or
13 years ago doing archeology and
Siberia around Lake Baikal as part of a
long-standing archaeological project
that’s centered here at the University
of Alberta the dogs were being treated
just like people when they died they
were being carefully placed in a grave
some of them are wearing necklaces when
they’re buried some they play spoons and
other offerings in the grave with the
dog with the idea I think being
essentially for some of them that they
had souls they had an afterlife and
people loved them so they treated them
like human persons when they when they
passed away
one of the things we’re doing here in
this laboratory is we’re studying the
diets of dogs in the past we do this by
looking at chemical components of the
bone the big question in dog
domestication research has been where
and when did dogs emerge from wolves but
I don’t think it really tells us very
much I’m more interested in what can we
learn about people’s relationships with
dogs in the past and learn more about
our own relationships with dogs what was
its life like and that’s more
interesting to me was it accompanying
people and hunting was it carrying packs
was it loved or was it abused these are
interesting questions I think more
interesting than just when
than there are burials of any other
animals including cats for example or
horses dogs seem to have a very special
place in human communities in the past
as soon as we see in the archaeological
record skeletal remains that look like a
modern dog we see dogs being buried I
mean 14,000 years ago we see the first
dog burials appear I started about 12 or
13 years ago doing archeology and
Siberia around Lake Baikal as part of a
long-standing archaeological project
that’s centered here at the University
of Alberta the dogs were being treated
just like people when they died they
were being carefully placed in a grave
some of them are wearing necklaces when
they’re buried some they play spoons and
other offerings in the grave with the
dog with the idea I think being
essentially for some of them that they
had souls they had an afterlife and
people loved them so they treated them
like human persons when they when they
passed away
one of the things we’re doing here in
this laboratory is we’re studying the
diets of dogs in the past we do this by
looking at chemical components of the
bone the big question in dog
domestication research has been where
and when did dogs emerge from wolves but
I don’t think it really tells us very
much I’m more interested in what can we
learn about people’s relationships with
dogs in the past and learn more about
our own relationships with dogs what was
its life like and that’s more
interesting to me was it accompanying
people and hunting was it carrying packs
was it loved or was it abused these are
interesting questions I think more
interesting than just when
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