1924. ScHARFF— Ow the Breeds of Dogs peculiar to Ireland. 83 



is an old word in Irish for Sheep-dog, viz., Con-huachaill 

 (hterally herd-dog). The word is alluded to in the ancient 

 Irish Laws as " the herd-dog of each cattle." In Welsh 

 of the loth century it is h :geilgi. It is evident, therefore, 

 that the Sheep-dog was well-known in Ireland since very 

 early times. We possess some evidence of this from the 

 ninth or tenth century at a time when Olaf was in Ire- 

 land for the purpose of a foray. When a peasant entreated 

 Olaf not to carry off his cattle, the latter replied " Take 

 them if you can distinguish them, but don't delay us." 

 The large house-dog of the peasant was sent into the herd 

 of many hundred cattle and succeeded in driving out the 

 number his owner wanted. All of them were marked 

 with the right mark, which showed that the dog was very 

 sagacious. 



The words matud or madrad, according to Miss Byrne, 

 were used in ancient times to signify an ordinary or 

 common-place dog (a dog of inferior breed). In modern 

 Irish these terms become madadh. They were sometimes 

 employed contemptuously to persons, as " cur " is in 

 English, and as the latter term was originally applied to a 

 watch-dog or a "house-dog" from the Danish korre, 

 we may assume that these Irish words also meant the 

 same class of dog. 



It seems probable, according to references given by 

 Dalziel from a Greek source, that the Irish in early Christian 

 times had two kinds of Greyhound — the smooth and the 

 long-haired. Richardson thinks that the smooth-coated 

 Greyhound is comparatively of recent date, but he gives no 

 evidence in support of his belief .^^ Considering that smooth- 

 haired Greyhounds were well-known in ancient Egypt, and 

 probably also in southern Europe, it is quite likely that 

 they found their way to Ireland at an early period in history. 

 In fact the word milchu which occurs in Irish manu- 

 scripts has always been rendered as Greyhound. In the old 

 Welsh laws of the loth century, the word milgi occurs 

 which has the same meaning, for mil is swift, and gi 

 dog. It seems to have been considered rather a precious 



^2 Richardson, H. D. • " The Dog, its origin, natural history and 

 varieties." New ed,, London-, 1857. 



