Neolithic Graves in Europe Hold Remains of Dogs and People

BARCELONA, SPAIN—AFP reports that Silvia Albizuri of the University of Barcelona has found evidence from at least four 6,000-year-old sites in northern Italy, southern France, and the northeast coast of the Iberian Peninsula that humans and dogs lived and worked together, and shared a diet based on grains and vegetables. The animals were even found in the graves of men, women, and children, she said, and were probably killed at the time of burial. A lack of cut marks on the bones suggests they were not butchered. About a quarter of the dogs in the burials were between 12 and 18 months old, perhaps because older, trained dogs were needed by the living for tasks such as hunting, transportation, protection, and herding. To read more about ancient dogs, go to “Denmark's Bog Dogs.”