Hoplites of the Archaic Age

[PMBardunias]

This dog is rare today even in Greece. Such dogs exist today in Crete as a local cretan race. They're not very big,but elegant dogs.

I own a Basenji, which is a little dog very much like this from Africa. There are a number of dog breeds in the mediterranean that are very ancient and part of this group. For eample the Ibizan hound, the Cirneco dell'Etna, the Pharoah hound, and perhaps the Canaan dog. Usually they are referred to as Pariah dogs, but that is not strictly accurate since a true pariah is a dog breeding wildly- like the Australian dingo which also looks simmilar in many ways. These dogs are true breeds.

My breed, the basenji, can do anything you'd want a dog to do. Hunt by sight and smell, race, retrieve, etc. They were not so specialized as the more recent breeds. The famous Laconian hound would have looked just like the Cretan hound.