Dubitando: Studies in History and Culture in Honor of Donald Ostrowski

Ni pes ni vyzhlets ni gonchaia sobaka: Images of Dogs in Rus’

Dubitando: Studies in History and Culture in Honor of Donald Ostrowski. Brian J. Boeck, Russell E. Martin, and Daniel Rowland, eds. Bloomington, IN: Slavica Publishers, 2012, 427–42.       Ni pes ni vyzhlets ni gonchaia sobaka: Images of Dogs in Rus’*   Ann Kleimola       “Neither  guard  dog  nor  field  dog  nor  scent  hound”:  this  Russian  aphorism   turned   up   in   a   large   collection   of   folk   sayings   preserved   in   a   17th-­‐‑century   manuscript.1  Unfortunately,  it  came  to  us  lacking  any  clarifying  context,  but  it   clearly   indicates   that   whatever   is   being   referenced   does   not   measure   up   to   what   was   expected   of   a   good   dog.   The   aphorism’s   terms   were   part   of   the   normal  vocabulary  of  early  Rus’.  Hunting  sobaki  were  generally  designated  by   an  adjective  denoting  their  function,  whether  as  sight  hound,  scent  hound,  or   tracker.  Even  vyzhlets/vyzhl’,  probably  the  least  commonly  encountered  of  the   three   terms   used   in   the   aphorism,   appears   in   a   Novgorod   birchbark   docu-­‐‑ ment  dated  c.  1380–1400.2  References  to  dogs  in  the  surviving  sources,  limited   though  they  are,  show  that  the  Rus’  elite  valued  dogs  for  two  practical  uses,   protection  of  life  and  property  and  assistance  in  hunting.  While  we  have  only   fragmentary  evidence  on  the  activities  of  canines,  putting  together  the  sherds   of  textual  and  graphic  references  allows  us  to  glimpse  the  sometimes  contra-­‐‑ dictory  images  of  dogs  in  Rus’  before  and  during  the  16th  century.3                                                                                                                               With  gratitude  for  assistance  to  the  Center  for  Russian,  East  European,  and  Eurasian   Studies,   University   of   Illinois   at   Urbana-­‐‑Champaign,   the   Slavic   Reference   Service,   University  of  Illinois  Libraries,  and  to  Charles  Halperin  and  Shirley  Glade.   1  “Povesti  ili  poslovitsy  vsenarodneishye  po  alfavitu  v  sbornike  XVII  veka,”  Starinnye   sborniki   russkikh   poslovits,   pogovorok,   zagadok   i   proch.   XVII–XIX   stoletii,   pts.   1   and   2,   comp.  Pavel  Simoni  [=Sbornik  Otdeleniia  russkogo  iazyka  i  slovesnosti  Imperatorskoi   Akademii  nauk  66,  no.  7]  (St.  Petersburg:  Tipografiia  Imperatorskoi  Akademii  nauk,   1899;  repr.,  Nendeln,  Liechtenstein:  Kraus  Reprint,  1966),  1:  128.     2  Birchbark   document   no.   135,   text   online   at   www.gramoty.ru   (accessed   4   September   2009).  On  the  varied  forms  of  the  term  in  the  Slavic  languages  and  its  eventual  usage   to   designate   the   Hungarian   pointer   (vizsla),   see   O.   A.   Egorov,   Ocherk   istorii   russkoi   psovoi  okhoty  (XV–XVIII  vv.)  (St.  Petersburg:  Dmitrii  Bulanin,  2008),  181–85.   3  The  17th-­‐‑century  picture  is  somewhat  more  complete;  Ann  Kleimola,  “Hunting  for   Dogs  in  17th-­‐‑Century  Muscovy,”  Kritika:  Explorations  in  Russian  and  Eurasian  History   11,  no.  3  (Summer  2010):  467–88;  reprinted  in  Everyday  Life  in  Russian  History:  Quotidian   Studies   in   Honor   of   Daniel   Kaiser,   ed.   Gary   Marker   et   al.   (Bloomington,   IN:   Slavica   Publishers,  2010),  61–82.  Citations  below  give  page  references  in  the  Kritika  pagination.   428 ANN KLEIMOLA Scientific  evidence  reveals  that  dogs  already  were  present  in  the  area  well   before   it   became   Rus’.   The   remains   of   two   large   ancient   dogs,   dating   to   c.   14,000–12,000  BC  and  among  the  earliest  found  in  Europe,  have  been  reported   from   the   Bryansk   region.4   In   Eastern   Fennoscandia   canine   bones   dating   to   around  1000  AD  have  been  found  with  those  of  other  domestic  animals  in  ex-­‐‑ cavations  in  areas  where  permanent  agriculture  was  practiced.5  This  indicates   the   prehistoric   existence   of   dogs   that   presumably   lived   and   interacted   with   human  society  in  the  Rus’  lands,  although  written  records  of  their  presence   appear   only   relatively   late   and   even   then   have   surprising   gaps.   Richard   Hellie’s  exhaustive  compilation  of  17th-­‐‑century  prices,  for  example,  includes   no   sales   data   for   dogs.6   Official   Russian   records   do   not   mention   working   dogs’   functions,   such   as   guarding   or   herding   livestock   or   catching   vermin,   and  we  have  no  Russian  manuals  on  estate  management,  animal  husbandry,   or  the  training  of  horses  and  dogs  parallel  to  the  works  of  the  ancient  Athe-­‐‑ nian   Xenophon   (c.   430–354   BC),   the   Roman   Varro   (116–27   BC),   and   their   successors.7   The  general  development  of  dog  breeds  in  the  modern  sense  was  largely   a  19th-­‐‑  and  20th-­‐‑century  phenomenon.  However,  various  types  of  dogs  dif-­‐‑ ferentiated   by   body   type   or   activity   had   appeared   c.   4000–3000   BC,   when   images  on  pottery  and  paintings  in  Egypt  and  the  Near  East  depict  canines  re-­‐‑ sembling  such  modern  sight  hounds  as  the  saluki  or  greyhound.  The  Roman   naturalist  Pliny  categorized  dogs  in  six  functional  categories:  house  protection   dogs,  shepherds,  sporting  dogs,  war  dogs,  scent  hounds,  and  sight  hounds.   According  to  Stephen  Budiansky’s  overview  of  canine  classifications,  for  cen-­‐‑ turies  “any  large  dog  was  a  mastiff,  any  dog  that  hunted  small  vermin  under-­‐‑ ground   was   a   terrier;   there...