When trying to infer the morphology of the aurochs from all available evidence, we do reach a point where comparisons with living relatives (wild bovines and domestic cattle) will not get us any further because there are limits to what the skeletal morphology tells us about the surrounding soft tissue. This is where ancient and historical depictions made by people who actually encountered the living animals become helpful. With this post, I want to do a review of what I think these depictions tell us about the morphology of the wild bovine.
This post features some images; if you are the copyright holder of these images (in those where the copyright is not yet expired) please notify me if you want me to remove the images in question.
-) Cave paintings and prehistoric engravings
All prehistoric depictions show a rather short dewlap in both sexes that becomes very short in the throat region. This shape of the dewlap is similar to what we see in banteng. The backline is almost always slightly depressed in the middle of the trunk, creating an S-shape. Bulls are often shown with a rather massive and sometimes longish morphology, most notably the engravings at the Grotta de Romito and Dordogne.
The hump is indicated in most ancient depictions, but not nearly as prominent as in depictions of steppe bison. There is mostly no edge between the neck and the shoulder hump in the bulls, similar to what we see f.e. in Sayaguesa but unlike what we see in Lidia and most other domestic bulls.
-) The Zliten mosaic
It shows a rather athletic bull that might be an aurochs with a morphology similar to young Lidia bulls.
-) The Vapheio cup
The bulls on the Vapheio cup from ancient Greece show curly hair between the horns and rather longish trunks. The waist is not as slender as in young Lidia bulls and the dewlap is again very short.
-) Bestiary of the British Library 12F XIII
This is the only depiction showing what might be a “mane” like in Lidia, Chillingham and some OVP Heck bulls. The trunk is rather short and narrowing towards the hips and the dewlap is short.
-) Aurochs hunt depiction from 16th century of Nuremberg
It shows a bull with an athletic body with a narrow waist and a short trunk.
-) von Herberstein’s taxidermy
There are two contemporaneous drawings showing Sigismund von Herberstein’s aurochs taxidermy, one from 1556 and one from 1557. These drawings, however, have to be viewed with caution; not because they are stylized, all contemporaneous aurochs depictions are, but because it is based on a taxidermy and we do not know how authentic this taxidermy was. Von Herberstein was also in possession of a wisent taxidermy that was drawn by the same artist at the same time, and the wisent drawing is rather accurate, so the taxidermies might have been quite authentic and so might be the drawings.
The 1556 drawing shows a massive body, short dewlap with a similar shape as in cave paintings,a hump not discernable (while illustrated very clearly in the wisent drawing), curly hair on the forehead, a slightly slanted pelvis as in banteng and gaur, which I believe to be the basal condition within the Bos clade.
The 1557 coloured drawing shows a short but massive trunk, slightly slanted pelvis, a hump that is slightly indicated, dewlap short but more than one “flap” under the throat (more like domestic cattle) and the same curly hair as in the older drawing.
-) Charles Hamilton Smith’s aurochs
CHS’s copy of the lost “Augsburg painting” shows a very short dewlap with two indicated flaps in the throat region, a deep chest and relatively trunk narrowing towards the hip, a hump that is only indicated and neck muscles set apart from the hump. The original is said to have shown a coarse black coat.
I leave this analysis as it is for this post, my conclusions for the aurochs’ anatomy will be covered in an upcoming post that will also include some new reconstructions avoiding my old mistakes. Stay tuned.
