May 6, 2019

Late last year, archaeologists in Egypt discovered a treasure trove of statues and mummified remains at a newly opened tomb complex in Saqqarah (also spelled Saqqara), an ancient site near Cairo. Antiquities are commonly found in Egypt, but this discovery was different: it was dedicated almost entirely to cats and scarab beetles. Saqqarah was the necropolis (burial ground) for Memphis, the capital of ancient Egypt for more than 2,000 years.

This gilded wooden cat statue was one of many discovered in a tomb complex at Saqqarah, Egypt, in November 2018. Credit: Egyptian Ministry of Antiquities

The recently opened tombs at Saqqarah are about 4,500 years old. Inside, archaeologists found some human remains as well as ceramic amulets and jars of writing utensils. The more interesting finds, however, were the dozens of mummified cats and scarab beetles. Some of the mummified cats may well have been treasured pets of the deceased, but others were probably included solely to please the feline goddess, Bastet. (Bastet was the goddess of cats as well as human fertility, love, and motherhood.) More than 100 gilded wooden cat statues were also in the tombs, along with an impressive bronze statue of Bastet. Animal statues and mummies are commonly found in ancient Egyptians tombs. Some animals were seen as physical manifestations of gods, and they were included in burials for companionship, food, protection, or religious offerings in the afterlife.

Archaeologists discovered the remains of these mummified scarabs at Saqqarah in November 2018. Credit: Egyptian Ministry of Antiquities

The preserved scarab beetles, a rare find, were wrapped in linen inside small decorated limestone sarcophagi (stone coffins). The Egyptians had a scarab beetle (or scarab-headed) deity, Khepri, a solar god of resurrection and immortality. Compared to Bastet, who had her own popular cult, Khepri was relatively obscure. Combined with the difficulty of embalming delicate beetles, that may explain the small numbers of scarab mummies found over the years.

Animal embalming was a vast industry in ancient Egypt. Sadly, this means that many animals—particularly cats and dogs—were captured or raised specifically to be offered as sacrifices for the dead. Millions of mummified animals have been found over the years. In 2015, a Saqqarah catacomb dedicated to the dog or jackal-like god of mummification, Anubis, was found stuffed with nearly 8 million animal mummies—most of them dogs. Such animals as baboons, cobras, crocodiles, falcons, ibises, and mice were also commonly mummified.

March 17, 2016

A Bernese mountain dog; whether sensing low blood sugar or finding humans who are lost in the mountains, dogs use their sense of smell as an amazing tool. Credit: © Shutterstock

Doctors took notice recently when news agencies reported on a Los Angeles boy with diabetes. His life was saved by a nose – his dog’s nose! Even though many details are not fully understood, it is well-known that a dog’s amazing ability to sniff out certain scents could be a real lifesaver. Now, medical experts are starting to study how dogs’ amazing sense of smell may help to diagnose and support people with a variety of health conditions.

The life-saving Labrador retriever was specially trained to help a family monitor their son’s blood-sugar level by smell, and to then alert other members of the family when it became dangerously high or low. People with diabetes, a disease that disrupts the body’s ability to use a sugar called glucose, often need insulin pills or injections several times a day to maintain near-normal blood-glucose levels. But, among people with diabetes, hypoglycemia may occur if they get too much insulin. Hypoglycemia can cause brain damage and even death if it is severe and untreated. On a recent night, the boy experienced a dangerous drop in blood sugar as he slept. But the clever pooch was trained to alert the boy’s parents, who came to the rescue.

Smell is the dog’s superpower. With more than 40 times more scent receptors compared to humans, dogs can smell thousands of odors that the human nose is unable to detect. Some scientists believe the dog’s supreme sense of smell is so sensitive that it can detect tiny biochemical changes (changes caused by chemicals used by living beings, such as animals or plants) that occur in the human body. Some of these changes, such as in the level of certain hormones or other chemicals in the blood, are associated with certain diseases and disorders. In some studies, dogs have been trained to sniff out unique scents associated with several types of cancer in humans, including skin cancer, breast cancer, and bladder cancer. Other dogs are trained to recognize subtle clues to indicate a person is about to experience a seizure, due to epilepsy or other conditions. Several organizations in the United States and other countries are currently training dogs to recognize different scents and other clues related to a person’s health.

Scientists do not yet know exactly how some dogs seem to be able to detect changes in a person’s health. They have not identified any specific chemical changes that the dogs are picking up among the many biochemical compounds that change in health and disease. Some experts think that dogs may be picking up subtle visual cues associated with various health conditions. Domestic dogs have lived with people as pets for more than 10,000 years, longer than any other animal. Over thousands of generations, these naturally social animals have learned to pay close attention to body language and other clues in order to live happily and successfully with their families.

It is well-known that the companionship of a dog can contribute to a person’s general well-being. Scientific studies have shown that petting a dog slows the heart rate and lowers the blood pressure of the person who is doing the petting. In the future, your pet dog may become an important part of your overall healthcare.

Cats, the ball is now in your court!

June 1, 2015

Genetic clues from a 35,000-year-old fossil provide evidence that the dog became our best friend thousands of years earlier than most archaeologists had previously thought. Until recently, scientists believed that dogs—as we know them today—and people had lived with each other for at least 14,000 years. That date made the dog the oldest known domesticated animal. However, this latest research pushes that date back even further. The findings suggest that dogs may have been first domesticated as long as 40,000 years ago.

Scientists know that modern domestic dogs are descended from wolves. Earlier genetic studies of wolves and ancient and modern dogs placed the dog’s domestication in Europe, China, or the Middle East. The oldest archaeological sites where human and dog remains occur together are dated from 11,000 to 12,000 years old. However, archaeologists now suspect that dogs may have been domesticated much earlier.

Geneticist Pontus Skoglund of the Harvard Medical School in Boston, Massachusetts, analyzed DNA obtained from the fossilized rib of a Siberian wolf discovered in 2010. The fossil was part of a collection recovered by a joint Swedish and Russian team on the Taymyr Peninsula in Russian Siberia in 2010. The frozen permafrost of this region preserves the remains of long-extinct prehistoric animals in such good condition that scientists can extract DNA from the fossilized bones.

Skoglund’s team compared the DNA they obtained from the 35,000-year-old rib bone of an ancient wolf, labeled Taimyr 1, to DNA sequences from ancient and living wolves and dogs. They found that the Taimyr 1 wolf belonged to a lineage that diverged from the ancestors of dogs and existing wolves at roughly the same time that dog and wolf lineages split from each other. From this, they used various techniques to calculate when the earliest dogs split from the ancestors of modern wolves. The results suggests that the two groups split some time between about 40,000 and 27,000 years ago.

Some dogs, including huskies, preserve DNA from a line of wolves that lived 35,000 years ago in the area that is now Siberia. (copyright melis/ShutterStock)

Some dogs today, including Siberian huskies and Greenland sled dogs, still preserve some DNA inherited from the wolf lineage that included Taimyr 1. The researchers involved believe that the first domestic dogs might have been hunting companions for people who settled Europe and Asia during the last Ice Age.

Other World Book articles:

• DNA

• Genetics

• Prehistoric people

Feb. 20, 2015

Dogs are remarkable judges of human character (such qualities as honesty and reliability), according to Japanese behavioral scientists at Kyoto University. Their study, published this week in the journal Animal Cognition, found that dogs will stop following the commands or other cues of a particular person once they decide that human is unreliable. Such research indicates that dogs have a sophisticated form of social intelligence that probably developed over their long association with humans.

Dogs’ long association with humans has allowed them to evolve the ability to judge some human traits. (Credit: © Shutterstock)

Dogs were the first animals domesticated (made tame) by humans. Scientists believe that dogs and people have lived with each other for at least 14,000 years. During that time, dog breeders have developed more than 400 breeds to perform various tasks and provide companionship. The intelligence, loyalty, and special abilities of many dog breeds make them ideal pets in nearly every society.

In a series of experiments with 34 different dogs, Japanese researchers pointed to a container that held a hidden food treat as a subject dog watched them. Previous research has shown that domestic dogs understand when a human points at an object. In the first stages of the experiment, the researcher always pointed to a container that held a treat. However, in later rounds, the researcher would point to containers that the dogs found were empty. In even later rounds, the same researcher once again pointed to a container that held a hidden treat. However, the dogs would no longer respond to a researcher who had previously steered them wrong.

The experiment shows that dogs are quick to respond to clues and commands given by humans, but they are equally quick to determine if a particular human is trustworthy. Most wild members of the dog family, such as wolves and coyotes, have a complex social organization and system of communication involving vocal cues and body positions. However, the scientists argue that the level of understanding of human body language and behavior demonstrated by domestic dogs far surpasses that of their wild ancestors.

Other World Book articles:

• Behavior
• Dog (Research guide)
• The Dog Who Came In From the Cold (a Special report)