Dingoes and domestication

Abstract

Aboriginal Australians are known to have routinely taken dingo pups from wild dens to rear as companion animals, with the mature canids typically returning to the bush to mate. Available accounts emphasise the strong emotional bonds between Indigenous people and “camp dingoes”, which were essentially raised as though they were human. Yet despite the closeness of human–canine relations in Australia, it is widely contended that Aboriginal people did not domesticate dingoes. The accepted thinking is that while the dingoes lived part of their lives with humans, they were ultimately “free agents” that foraged and reproduced independently. Here, I propose that the Aboriginal practice of raising wild‐caught dingo pups generated a distinct population of free‐roaming adult dingoes that were socialised to interact with humans and may have remained loosely associated with them. I suggest that this hitherto unrecognised dingo ecotype, which should not be thought of as truly wild, yielded most of the pups taken from the bush by humans. Contrary to received wisdom, therefore, Aboriginal peoples’ interactions with dingoes involved management and domestication processes, but not as conventionally defined (i.e., controlled breeding, artificial selection).

Before Azaria: A Historical Perspective on Dingo Attacks

“…[ 87 ] (p. 94)). A plethora of papers on human–dingo interactions and dingo behaviour generally also appeared in the anthropological literature in the 1970s (for summaries, see [ 5 , 21 ]). There was no explicit mention in any these studies of dingoes attacking humans.…”

“…This is beyond the remit of the current study. Historical accounts suggest that during the period of early European settlement Indigenous peoples in Australia had a complex relationship with dingoes that was based on taking pre-weaned pups from wild dens and hand-rearing them for temporary adoption as ‘pets’ [ 5 , 20 , 21 ]. A separate study is required to examine this human-canid relationship in detail, such that any evidence for dingoes attacking Aboriginal people can be fully contextualised.…”

The Role of Socialisation in the Taming and Management of Wild Dingoes by Australian Aboriginal People

“…Although carefully provisioned and doted on in their puppyhood, these dingoes were weaned off close human caretaking as they aged into adolescence. With little nutrition freely available in the camp, and a strong urge to disperse and reproduce, tame dingoes departed human society soon after becoming sexually mature, dispersing back into the Bush in order to live and breed independently in the wild [ 15 ]; although it is possible that in some times and places there were individuals that either did not stray far from the camps or indeed essentially remained within them throughout their lives [ 32 , 33 , 34 ]. This section outlines the ways in which Aboriginal people managed tame dingoes, with particular attention to their efforts to socialise them to domestic life and thus produce acceptable behavioural dispositions.…”

“…The broad consensus among present-day scholars is that despite the close relationship between Aboriginal people and dingoes the latter were generally free-roaming canids that lived independently of humans [ 3 , 15 , 30 , 31 ]. While some aspects of this standard story can be questioned [ 32 , 33 , 34 ], it does seem evident that where the Aboriginal–dingo relationship was documented it was based on the capture and (temporary) adoption of wild-born pups [ 15 ]. Apart from these aspects, much remains unknown about the nature of the earlier human–dingo relationship [ 32 , 33 , 34 ].…”

“…While some aspects of this standard story can be questioned [ 32 , 33 , 34 ], it does seem evident that where the Aboriginal–dingo relationship was documented it was based on the capture and (temporary) adoption of wild-born pups [ 15 ]. Apart from these aspects, much remains unknown about the nature of the earlier human–dingo relationship [ 32 , 33 , 34 ]. Of particular significance is that the interspecies companionship that was observed to have existed between Aboriginal people and dingoes seems to have no direct parallel in modern experience.…”