I keep on looking meticulously into old primary sources, desperately trying to find something “new” about the aurochs or at least something that was not discussed much in the literature. This time I might have found something interesting.
C. Gesner, 1583
Gesner in a 1583 edition of Historia animalum writes that aurochs were hunted by seizing a calf, binding it to a post so that adult animals come at its calls for help. He also describes the wisent and the aurochs, so he knew both are different animals, but the wisent section shows an aurochs skull Gesner was sent from England and a drawing of a bovine head that could be an aurochs. It shows downwards and inwards facing horns, the curly forehead hair and barely any beard and smooth hair on the neck. Some domestic bulls have a “mane”, which is why the presence of the frizzy hair in the throat of the depicted animal does not rule out an aurochs to me, and the skull is definitely an aurochs.
S. v. Herberstein, 1556
Even more interesting is Siegmund von Herberstein’s text Rerum Moscoviticarum Commentarii from 1556. Yes, it's the one with the woodcuts of his taxidermied aurochs and wisent. But there are also editions showing a depiction of an aurochs in the wild with a bulky but short trunk, curly hair between the horns and – as usual – incorrect horns.
The book is freely available on the web in Latin, German and English. In the English translation (Notes upon Russia), on p. 96 it is written:
“Masovia, which borders on Lithuania, is the only province which has in it the kind of buffalo which in the language of the country is called thur, but which we Germans may with propriety call urox. They are a sort of wild oxen, not unlike tame oxen, except that they are entirely black, with a line down the back having white blended with it. They are not very plentiful, and there are certain districts which are charged with the care of them; and it only in some few preserves that they are kept. They are allowed to herd with tame cows, but have a mark set upon them to distinguish them. This is done because they are afterwards looked upon as degraded by the other buffaloes, and are not admitted into their herd; and the calves which are produced by the cross breed are not long lived. The King Sigismund Augustus, at the time I was ambassador at his court, made me a present of one which was just dropped, and which the hunters had taken, driven half-lifeless from the herd. It had the skin which covers the forehead cut away, which I suppose was done for some purpose, but from thoughtlessness I neglected to enquire why it was done. This is certain, that girdles made of the hide of the urox are much esteemed, and it is a vulgar opinion that parturition is assisted by wearing them”
I find this paragraph highly interesting. First of all, we can be sure it refers to the aurochs, because it is explicitly referred to as “thur”, which is Polish for aurochs – in historic Poland, wisent and aurochs were never confused for each other because both animals were still extant and noticed as different species. Also, he mentions that the aurochs is very rare and is taken care of in certain districts of Masovia, which were probably Jaktorow and Wiskitki because of the given time Herberstein wrote the text. He also refers to the brutal ritual that the frizzy curly hair between the horns is cut of from the aurochs alive in order to make belts that are supposed to ease parturition, which is also described by Swiecicky (van Vuure, 2005). Herberstein also mentions the lightly coloured dorsal stripe. So he is definitely talking about aurochs on this paragraphs, and so far his notions are in agreement with other sources.
What is the most striking part of the paragraph, however, is that he writes that aurochs were allowed to herd with domestic cows. Schneeberger, who visited Jaktorow, described that aurochs bulls that were seen covering domestic cows were shot and given to the farmer in order to compensate him. However, different districts might have had different handling practices. But what is really curious is that aurochs were marked in order to distinguish them in the herd – one would actually assume that aurochs were easy to distinguish by their size (yes, historic aurochs were slightly smaller than Pleistocene ones, but Schneeberger still mentions aurochs from the same region being “much larger” than domestic cattle), behaviour and overall appearance. Of course rural domestic cattle were less-derived than today. Perhaps it would indeed be not that easy to distinguish an aurochs in a, say, Sayaguesa herd to the untrained eye. But it is still a notion that sounds dubious to me. What is also very interesting and slightly less curious is that aurochs would not have accepted the bull that was with the domestic cows afterwards. This is surprising, given that adult bulls would have been more or less solitary anyway, but not entirely implausible (perhaps recognizable by the changed scent of the animal) – there were certainly aspects of the aurochs’ behaviour that we do not know about.
Herberstein also mentions that the hybrid offspring would have been short-lived. This is roughly in agreement with Schneeberger, who states that domestic cows covered by aurochs bulls will miscarry or give birth to a “non-viable calf”. So we have two independent historic sources describing interbreeding problems between aurochs of that time and region with domestic cattle of that time and region. Therefore, there might indeed have been some reproductive barriers between these bovines. Another possibility would be that this reflects just a rumor among farmers of that region. I can imagine farmers not being very happy with aurochs hybrids and perhaps a myth that they cannot successfully interbreed developed over Chinese whispers. But that is just a speculation. What we do know from genetic evidence, however, is that European aurochs did interbreed with domestic cattle on this continent and produced viable and fertile offspring that left genetic traces in modern European cattle.
So, were aurochs bulls deliberately added to domestic herds in these very late historic times, perhaps in order to increase hardiness and robustness of the cattle? This is not entirely implausible, given that Poland is also known for having created zubrons, hybrids of domestic cattle and wisent, for this very reason. However, what does not make sense is if the hybrid calves were non-viable or short-lived, why would farmers let aurochs cover the cows? That would have been an economic loss, as Schneeberger describes (which is why the bulls were shot and given to the farmer). Another possibility is that only female hybrids were kept by the farmers and the male hybrids were not of any use because of their behaviour, in which case the farmer might still have received compensation for the 50/50 chance of an economic loss. However, I am engaging in speculation after speculation here, we simply do not know.
However, this did not hinder me from painting a branded late-surviving aurochs amongst a domestic cow herd:
“Buffalo” actually means aurochs
“Bubal” originally was the Arabic word for aurochs, after its extinction it got transferred to the bubal hartebeest. The Romans turned this into bubalus when they captured aurochs from Africa, until they adopted urus from Germanic ur. Bubalus then changed to buffalus and finally to buffalo – so Herberstein is historically correct in referring to the aurochs as buffalo here. Therefore, if there is a discussion if “buffalo” should only refer to members of the Bubalini clade or also to bison, historically both positions are wrong, the all-original buffalo is the aurochs.
Polish Landraces that could be interesting
This prompted me to look into Polish cattle landraces, two of which are particularly interesting. The Polska Czerwone, the Polish Red, has the same reddish brown colour as Angeln cattle but a much more aurochs-like and less derived build in having a shorter trunk, longer legs, a more athletic body and a larger head. You can see them in this or this video for example.
The second one, the Bydle bialogrzbiete, the Polish Whiteback, is another interesting one. Not only for its build, but because some bulls of the breed have been found to carry Y chromosome haplotypes not found in any international breed – but do not get too excited about that, this particular Y chromosome diversity has also been found in another landrace, the Polish whitehead breed, and is likely of taurine origin and not a reminiscence of interbreeding with the last Polish aurochs.
Prusak et al. 2015: “Y chromosome genetic diversity and breed relationships in native Polish cattle assessed by microsatellite markers”, Turkish Journal of Biology.
Nevertheless, those Polish landraces would be a great addition to the “breeding-back” pool, especially as the Polish dislike Heck cattle for political reasons. A project working with these Polish landraces, adding breeds for body size, horn size and colour, could be worthwhile pursuing.
