BRITISH PARK-CATTLE 
75 
In view of the great discrepancy of opinion as to 
the origin and relationships of white park-cattle, it 
will be advisable to give a review of some of the 
leading views which have been expressed on this 
subject. 
To go back to the reign of King Knut (Canute), 
A.D. 1014-1035, it is stated in the forest-laws that 
" there are also a great number of cattle which, 
although they live within the limits of the forest, and 
are subject to the charge and care of the middle sort 
of men, or regadors, nevertheless cannot at all be 
reputed beasts of the forest, as wild horses, bubali^ 
wild cows, and the like." In this case, as has been 
pointed out by Mr. J. E. Harting,^ the word bubali is 
almost certainly intended to indicate the wild aurochs, 
just as it is in a passage cited in the preceding 
chapter (p. 39). The forest-cattle of Knut's time were, 
therefore, it may be assumed, not aurochs ; and it is 
also practically certain that they were not white, 
although they may possibly have presented a tendency 
to albinism ; for, as stated above, the white park- 
breeds were only kept true by the elimination of 
dark-coloured calves. 
Nevertheless, there were white cattle — and these 
with red ears — at an even earlier date in Britain, for 
we find in the Welsh laws of Howell Dha, promul- 
gated about the year 940, mention of such animals, 
which were ordered to be paid in compensation for 
any offences committed against the princes of Wales. 
These, however, as pointed out by Mr. Harting,^ 
were manifestly a domesticated breed, and doubtless 
more or less nearly similar to the modern strain of 
^ Extinct British Animals, London, 1880, p. 221, 
2 Op. cit. p. 220. 
