OVHounds.com - Basset Hounds, Afghan Hounds and other Dogs

The first chapter, "Everyone Loves a Wiener," traces the time-honored association between Dachshunds and hot dogs; shows how the Dachshund?s temperament and body form mimic those of its traditional prey; and sorts out the modern systems of dividing the breed up into show classes. Hutchinson?s second chapter, "Dachondroplasia," compares and contrasts the genetics of dwarfing in Dachshunds, other dwarf breeds, and human beings. "The Low-Down on Dachshunds and Bassets" documents the proposition that Dachshund has for most of its long history been indistinguishable from the basset. This chapter features chronologically ordered, fully annotated, and newly translated citations of every reference to the word Dachshund in German literature and art, from its first appearance in 1682 until the end of the eighteenth century. The French sources from which most of the German citations were derived are also fully cited. The final chapter, "The Dirt on Dachshunds and Terriers," argues that the Dachshund is functionally a terrier; that no terriers prior to the sixteenth century qualify as short-legged forerunners of the Dachshund; that Elizabethan terriers were in fact French-style bassets; and that modern Scottish terriers took their short-leggedness from Dachshunds smuggled into Scotland by Gypsies in the eighteenth century.