THE TURBARY OR BUNDNER SHEEP 145 



Both these races came from Asia, apparently by 

 way of Mesopotamia ; their original home having 

 probably been in the neighbourhood of the Caspian, 

 more especially the district bordering the mountain 

 range known as the Kopet-Dagh, which forms the 

 boundary between Persia and Turkestan.' 



These people brought with them the turbary 

 sheep, and apparently also the short-horned ox 

 of the Pfahlbauten.^ 



A few years ago the turbary sheep still survived 

 sparingly in the B linden Oberland, Canton Grisons, 

 especially in the neighbourhood of Disentis, where 

 it is known as the Biindnerschaf ; but as it likewise 

 occurs in the Nalps Alps of the Grisons, it is also 

 termed Nalpserschaf. According to the detailed 

 description given by Dr. Conrad Keller, whose 

 figure is reproduced in pi. x. fig. i, the turbary 

 sheep is a small, black-faced and black-legged 

 breed, with a moderately long tail, reaching down 

 to the hocks, small, narrow, outwardly directed, and 

 very mobile ears, a concave chaffron, and small, 

 laterally compressed horns, with fore-and-aft edges, 

 which usually ascend nearly in the plane of the 



' See E. L. Trouessart, " Origine Prdhistorique de nos Mammiftres 

 Domestiques," Biologica, Paris, 191 1, p. 296. 



' Certain difficulties with regard to the origin of the Pfahlbauten 

 shorthorn are discussed on p. 138 of my book on The Ox and Its 

 Kindred {honAon, 1912). If the Pfahlbauten shorthorn be identical 

 with the Prehistoric Celtic shorthorn of England, it would seem 

 to have originated from the Asiatic aurochs, and not, as Dr. Duerst 

 believes, from the zebu. If the two are distinct, the zebu-ancestry 

 may be admitted. 



K 



