The Bullmastiff

By Eric Makins

Originally published in early 1900s. The detailed and illustrated contents include: Origin and History - Clubs and Breeds - Standard - Shows - Famous Dogs - Management - Selection of Stock - Breeding - Training - Showing etc. Many of the earliest dog books, particularly those dating back to the 1900s and before, are now extremely scarce and increasingly expensive. Home Farm Books are republishing many of these classic works in affordable, high quality, modern editions, using the original text and artwork.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Read Books Ltd.
• Release date: Nov 15, 2011
• ISBN: 9781447492337

Book preview

Preface.

Although the Bullmastiff has been known for many years, and more than a decade has passed since his recognition as a pure breed by the Kennel Club, little has been written of his history and establishment as one of our most popular non-sporting varieties of dog. This fact, coupled with the insistent demands made to me by a number of devotees of the breed, prompted me to compile this small handbook.

It has no pretensions to being encyclopædic; rather is it a gentle guide for the tyro, written with the hope that he may glean a little knowledge of what has gone before, in the making of a grand breed of dog, who has been much maligned in the past, and has perhaps not been accorded the treatment which he certainly deserves. If the expert should find in it some little fact or record that even he did not know, or if his memory is refreshed, then my task is complete.

In conclusion, I should like to thank all those who have given me information at various times, and in particular to express my gratitude to the Hon. Mrs. J. Murray Smith, Miss E. Hardingham, Mr. H. T. W. Bowell, Mr. E. Burton, and Mr. Peirce, M.R.C.V.S.

ERIC MAKINS.

CHAPTER I.

Origin and History.

THE Bullmastiff, as a distinct breed, is one of the most modern on the Kennel Club’s official register; but the cross between the Bulldog and the Mastiff has been known for generations past. It is from this cross that the Bullmastiff, as we know it to-day, originated.

Reference to the Bullmastiff is made in many books and correspondence published during the last century, and it is fairly safe to assume that a definite cross between the two breeds was extensively bred and maintained in some parts of England. Other blood may have been introduced from time to time, as the principal purpose for which these animals were used was for guarding persons and property. No doubt, whereas one man found that the first cross, i.e., Bulldog-Mastiff, was sufficient for his needs, another did not—and for reasons of his own, such as size or colour—introduced the Bloodhound or the Great Dane or the St. Bernard.

Records of the breed during this stage are very hazy, and are mostly hearsay, or tales which have been handed down through the generations of old-time fanciers of the breed.

Most writers and historians agree that these two breeds are descended from common stock, and, further, that the Mastiff is a product of the dog that was indigenous to these islands in the days of the Ancient Britons before the Roman invasion.

How this dog came to the British Isles is a matter of conjecture, but possibly they were brought here by the Phœnicians during their trading expeditions, for a dog of similar proportions is known to have existed at this period in Central Asia. There is a dog depicted on one of the bas-reliefs of Nineveh, in the Assyrian Gallery in the British Museum, as the Assyrian dog, and Idstone recalls that this animal is precisely the same as the Mastiff, Barry, the property of Mr. Kingdon, which he saw at the Plymouth Show in 1870.

There are also other bas-reliefs in the Assyrian Gallery which show dogs in hunting scenes, all of which resemble the Mastiff in appearance. These antiquities were removed from the palace of Assur-bani-pal, who reigned during the years 668-626 B.C.

History records references to the broad-mouthed dogs of Britain. References are frequently made to the existence of a breed of dogs which were used for gladiatorial purposes by the Romans, and which were probably imported by them from these islands.

Writing in the 14th century, Edmund de Langley, in his work, The Mayster of Game, mentions two distinct breeds of dogs as being in existence at this time—the Molussus and the Alaunt. The former was used for a guard of persons and property, and the latter is described as short-headed and pugnacious, used for baiting the bull, and gifted with a liking for hanging on with its mouth to the objects of its attack.

Dr. Caius, in 1750, mentions one variety only, the Mastive or Bandog, as does the Rev. M. B. Wynn, writing in the middle of the last century in his History of the Mastiff, but states that there is a great resemblance between the Mastiff and the Bulldog.

Turning now to the Bulldog, whose history is so much bound up in that of the Mastiff, we are told by that prolific writer on dogs, Mr. Rawdon B. Lee, that the first written mention of them was made in 1631, when one, Prestwich Eaton, from St. Sebastian, wrote to George Wellingham, of St. Swithin’s Lane, London, for a Mastiff and two good Bulldogs. Bulldogs were, of course, used primarily for bull-baiting, and as this sport was known to have existed as far back as the year 1200 or thereabouts, some kind of a Bulldog must have been bred then.

Stonehenge, in his great classic, The Dogs of the British Islands, in his chapter on the Mastiff, says: Like the Bulldog the Mastiff is in all probability indigenous to Great Britain, the exact origin of both being lost in obscurity. This seems to sum up the situation to a nicety, and it would seem fairly obvious that the Bullmastiff is a breed, the progenitors of which are the oldest known breeds of dogs in the British Isles. Mention of Stonehenge also brings to mind that in the second edition of his book an engraving from an old picture by Abraham Hondius is