Dell'Antico Cane Corso Di Casa Marziali allevamento riconosciuto E.N.C.I. - F.C.I.
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Sei in: Articoli: CANE CORSO ITALIAN MOLOSSER HISTORY🇬🇧:

Cane Corso history

The Italian Molossian dog's origin goes back to time immemorial that neither history nor archaeology can give univocal certainty. First of all, we have to precise that when we talk about Italian Cane Corso, at the same time we also mean the Neapolitan Mastiff because (at least this is certain) they share the same genetic heritage (the Neapolitan Mastiff is a created breed, just like the modern Italian Cane Corso that looks like to the Boxer dog; but we will talk about it later). It can be assumed considering the word history of the named used to call the Italian Cane Corso:massatinus, that means guardian of the farm; cohors, that means double meaning courtyards dog and cohort dog at the same time; for example, in Puglia he is Cane corzu o Can ' Corz, understood as tough, strong.

According to some theories, the Italian Cane Corso comes from the big molossian dogs common among middle east populations: Assyrian, Babylonians, Greeks of Epirus and was imported in europe by Phoenician people, who used these kinds of dogs as guardian and as commodity; Pliny the Elder quotes this dog in his book "Naturalis Historia", where he tells about the two big dogs which king of Illyrians gave Alexander the Great as a gift.In addiction to these dogs already living in the italic peninsula (we have just said: They have been imported from other countries by Phoenician people), other kinds of dogs were added by Romans who brought them after the military campaign in Gallia: so, Romans crossbreed their molossian dogs and celtic dogs.

The Romans had a very strong interest in fighting dogs indeed (canis pugnax o pugnaces). In fact, perhaps during the Britain military campaign, they did create the figure of “ procurator cynegii”, a special kind of officer who had to choose the most suitable dogs as necessary: First of all in warfare, to crossbreed other bloodlines so as to create dogs suitable for the big game hunting, but also dogs suitable for circus, where they did fight against bears, lions and tigers. According to the tales of that time, four dogs were able to kill a lion. At that time, a very common custom was the “Tauromachy”, (from ancient greek, tauros (ταύρος) = bull e máchē (μάχη)=battle) that still exists in Spain and did exist even in Italy, although illegally, up until a few years ago. The skill of the group of dogs (made by four dogs) or even of only one dog, was to immobilize a bull and tackling it by the ear or by the muzzle, two very sensitive points, so as to keep the bull fixed because of the big pain.

But the most important purpose of using dogs was the war and they did train thanks to some human beings, perhaps prisoners or doomed to die, and, in the absence of them, thanks to the puppets fulled up with blood and guts of some dead animals so as to dog could link eating and enemies: dogs did harnessed with a harness made by leather or light metal provided with some rostrums that can be useful in case of fighting against the cavalry of the enemy.

Using warfare dogs has lasted for centuries in some different ways: by Spanish conquistadors so as to kill as many South American Indians as possible and, more recently, by the Italian army, during the italic Turkish war (1912), when some subjects of "Dogo Sardo" became involved in war .The Romans certainly did use some dogs already living in Italy – native sheepdogs - in order to increase the genetic makeup of dogs imported from other countries; so they did obtain some different kinds of working dogs. As a result of this, they mainly got two types: the heavy and the lightweight; the first fit for war and fighting against wild beasts and second for hunting, sometimes conveniently crossbred with greyhound dogs so as to highlight the velocity and the grasp. After the fall of Roman Empire, only few lords, who were landowners and often cattle farmer, could afford having these kinds of dogs; in fact, they did need them and were able to keep them. According as needs, these dogs were crossbred with greyhound dog or hunting dog or tough sheepdog "canis pastoralis" in order to obtain a more dreadful shepherd dog. It was not rare that these dogs – born thanks to the selection based on the needs – could mate with some original bloodline molossian dogs. Besides, lords used to give these dogs to their servants who did take care of them and did arrange mating with similar dogs and then did create new bloodlines featured by white spots, by homogeneous white coated, lighter than usual and provided with a hair coat more long; in this way they did get more fit for fighting against bad weather and fit for the poor diet given them by servants; at the same time, main features of the breed could be preserved.

These dogs had to earn a living and, in case of absence of war, they had to do as best as they could to help their owners in the life and death struggle; people who lived in the countryside did avail themselves of these dogs in order to take care of beef cattle. Among the few people who could afford to keep heavy bloodline dogs there were butchers, who used to take advantage of dogs so as to keep fixed bulls during the catch and during the killing; this is a custom that has been lasted until the first decades of the 20th century, getting a spectacular appearance, which is the heritage of the ancestral Tauromachy. Another way of using this breed was as a caretaker of pigs, sheep and sometimes as shepherd, in any case as guardian and even as "bodyguard dog" so as to dissuade the spiteful persons. He was and he still remains the boar hunting dog per excellence and it is not rare that two Italian Cane Corso well trained since they were puppies, can kill one boar, although it should be perfect being four dogs: in fact, two dogs should tackle the boat by the muzzle and the others should tackle the boar by the genitals in order to keep him fixed because of the great pain and allow the hunter kill the boar with the knife (this is a traditional custom that is today performed together with using the gun); after killing, the hunter cuts the genitals of boar as soon as possible in order to avoid that meat becomes inedible because of the bad taste.