Genomic history of early dogs in Europe
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Resource type
Journal article
Creator (person)
Bergstrà¶m, Anders
Furtwà¤ngler, Anja
Johnston, Sarah
Rosengren, Erika
Breidenstein, Abagail
Booth, Thomas
McCabe, Jesse B
Peto, Jessica
Williams, Mia
Kelly, Monica
Tait, Frankie
Baumann, Chris
Radzeviciute, Rita
Barrington, Christopher
Anastasiadou, Kyriaki
Gilardet, Alexandre
Glocke, Isabelle
Sherman, Mattias
Brativnyk, Anastasia
Herbig, Alexander
Prà¼fer, Kay
Pfrengle, Saskia
Gretzinger, Joscha
Feuerborn, Tatiana R
Reiter, Ella
Linderholm, Anna
Charlton, Sophy
Racimo, Fernando
Mikkola, Lea
Anderson-Whymark, Hugo
Baird, Douglas
Gotfredsen, Anne Birgitte
Bocherens, Hervé
Bridault, Anne
Brocke, Rainer
Drucker, Dorothée G
Fairbairn, Andrew S
Frantz, Laurent
Gasparyan, Boris
Giemsch, Liane
Germonpré, Mietje
Janssens, Luc
Kandel, Andrew W
Kjà¦r, Kurt
Là¡zniÄ kovà¡-Galetovà¡, Martina
Loponte, Daniel
Magnell, Ola
Martin, Louise
Mà¼nzel, Susanne C
MustafaoÄŸlu, Gà¶khan
Mà¥ge, Bjà¸rnar
Perri, Angela
Pfenninger, Franziska
RoblàÄ kovà¡, Martina
Roman-Binois, Annelise
SarıtaÅŸ, à–zlem
Schà¤ppi, Katharina
Sheridan, J A
Sjà¶gren, Karl-Gà¶ran
Storà¥, Jan
Sà¸rensen, Lasse Vilien
Tafelmaier, Yvonne
Ter-Nedden, Florian
Thalmann, Olaf
Larson, Greger
Schuenemann, Verena J
Krause, Johannes
Skoglund, Pontus
Date published
March 26, 2026
Abstract
The earliest morphologically identifiable dogs are from Europe and date to at least 14,000 years ago , although early remains are also found in other regions. The origin of early dogs in Europe, and their relationships to other dogs, has remained elusive in the absence of genome-wide data. Similarly, although dogs were the only domestic animal to predate agriculture, little is known about how the arrival of Neolithic farmers from Southwest Asia affected the dogs living with European Mesolithic hunter-gatherers. Here we analysed 216 canid remains, including 181 from Palaeolithic and Mesolithic Europe. We developed a genome-wide capture approach that enriched endogenous DNA by 10–100-fold and could distinguish dog from wolf ancestry for 141 of 216 remains. The oldest dog data that we recovered are from a 14,200-year-old dog from the Kesslerloch site in Switzerland, and we find that it shares ancestry with later worldwide dogs—inconsistent with the hypothesis that European Upper Palaeolithic dogs derived wholly from a separate domestication process. The Kesslerloch dog already displays more affinity to Mesolithic, Neolithic and present-day European dogs than to Asian dogs, demonstrating that dog genetic diversification had started well before 14,200 years ago. We find a Neolithic influx of Southwest Asian ancestry into Europe, but this seems to have been of smaller magnitude than in humans, suggesting that Mesolithic dogs contributed substantially to Neolithic, and, ultimately, probably also modern, European dogs.
Journal title
Nature
Volume
651
Publisher
Springer Science and Business Media LLC
ISSN
0028-0836
eISSN
1476-4687
Date accepted
January 8, 2026
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