CHAPTER II. 

 BREEDS OF CHICKENS. 



Origin of the Domestic Fowl.— When man lived in a primi- 

 tive state and was a sa\age, all animals and birds were also wild . 

 The first step in ad\'ance came when he began to realize 

 the value of wealth, to bring animals under control and 

 develop flocks and herds. He was still a wanderer and a 

 nomad. It was prolmbly not until the necessity of co- 

 operative effort in protecting his wealth against enemies, 

 coupled with the increasing population, forced him to take 

 up settled life in villages, that birds were domesticated. 

 Poultry production was from the first, as it is now, essentially 

 a home industry. 



While it appears likely that fowls were first captured for 

 fighting purposes, and later domesticated for flesh and eggs, 

 the earliest actual reference to poultry states that the 

 Chinese Emperor Fu-Hsi, who li\'ed from 334f to 3227 B.C., 

 taught his people to breed fowls.' Cock-fighting is still a 

 favorite pastime among the native princes of India, from 

 whence our domestic fowls originally came. 



So far as records show, fowls were taken eastward nearly a 

 thousand years before they appeared in Europe. A Chinese 

 encyclopedia, said to have been compiled 1400 years before 

 Christ, makes mention of fowls as '' creatures from the West." 

 "The first actual reference in Western literature to the fowl 

 occurs in the writings of Theognis and Aristophanes between 

 400 and 500 b.c."^ 



Progenitors of the Breeds.— I )arwin tliought that all modern 

 breeds of fowls were the offspring of a common ancestor. 

 The difi'erences noted between the phlegmatic Cochin and 

 the sprightlj' Leghorn, he considered to have been brought 



' V. Fries, Abriss der Gcschichte Chinas. 

 ' Brown, Races of Domestic Poultry. 

 4 (49) 



