Saluki
The Saluki is a sighthound from the Middle East, where its standard says it has been used to hunt for thousands of years. It has no single home country: in the game, any of 16 countries from Egypt to Iran counts as right.
What do you know about the Saluki?
By Middle East tradition, how were Salukis passed from one owner to another?
Another long-haired sighthound, from Afghanistan. Which one?
Where was the first official European standard for the Saluki written?
Three big genetic studies looked for the breeds that branch off earliest in the dog family tree. How did the Saluki do?
Why does the Saluki have no single country?
Because it belongs to a whole region. Its breed standard says Salukis vary in type, and that the variation is wanted. The reason is the special place the Saluki holds in Arab tradition, and the immense size of the Middle East, where it has been used as a hound of the chase for thousands of years.
Each tribe kept the Salukis best suited to the game of its own area. And by Middle East tradition, Salukis are not bought or sold but presented as marks of honour. So the dogs given to Europeans and brought to Europe came from very different terrain and climates, and looked different. The British standard of 1923, the first official European one, was written to cover all of them.
Is the Saluki the oldest dog breed?
Not as a plain fact, but it is among the breeds that look oldest in their genes. Three large studies, in 2004, 2010 and 2012, each placed it in the small group of breeds that branch off earliest in the dog family tree. Only four breeds in this game made that group in all three: the Akita, the Basenji, the Saluki and the Shar Pei.
The 2012 study, by Larson and colleagues, warns against reading that as age. It calls these breeds “basal” rather than ancient, because what they share is little recent mixing with other breeds, which the team links to geographic and cultural isolation. In their words, they “only appear so because of their relative isolation”. The oldest dog breeds page has the full table.
Saluki or Afghan Hound?
Both are long-haired or fringed sighthounds. The Afghan carries far more coat, with long hair over its body and a silky top-knot; the Saluki is smooth, with feathering on its ears, legs, the backs of its thighs and the underside of its tail. Some Salukis, the smooth variety, have no feathering at all.
| Saluki | Afghan Hound | |
|---|---|---|
| Home | The Middle East | Afghanistan |
| Height | Average 58 to 71 cm; bitches proportionally smaller | Males 68 to 74 cm, females 63 to 69 cm |
| Coat | Smooth and silky, feathered on ears, legs and tail | Long and very fine, short along the back of grown dogs |
Other sighthounds
Facts from the Saluki’s official breed standard (No. 269, 25 October 2000), the Afghan Hound standard (No. 228) and Larson G. et al., PNAS, 2012 (full text).