Aurochs anatomy revisited

In the latest post, I reviewed much of the ancient and historical aurochs depictions and what they tell us.

Here are some conclusions in this regard:

 

A shoulder hump present and visible, more so bulls than in cows but present in both sexes, but not nearly as prominent as in bison – this is also in line with the fact that the shoulder spines are not as high in the aurochs as in bison.

The dewlap likely had almost a gap in the throat region, similar to what we see in banteng.

The pelvis was probably slanted to some degree; we see this also in other wild bovines and this is likely basal for Bos.

Adult bulls probably made a massive and somewhat hefty impression as they are often portrayed in that fashion. Likely there was no edge between the neck and the hump in bulls in the “default position” of the neck.

 

With this information, I attempted some new reconstructions, also trying to avoid my common mistakes I tend to make when I reconstruct the aurochs.

 

Most puzzling to me is the length and shape of the trunk. Let us look at the length first.

When I do my reconstructions, I always consider the cartilage between the leg elements that is missing in the skeletons. This makes the legs longer in life than what they appear in the skeleton. There were of course also the intervertebral discs between the vertebrae, which I also considered but assumed that most mounts take them into account. Looking at dissected cattle, I think, however, that some skeletal mounts might underestimate the amount of cartilage between the vertebrae. This means that the ratio between shoulder height and trunk length was certainly not exactly as in the skeletons. The exact ratio in life is, however, hard to determine without accessing the skeleton directly. Some guesswork is involved, and this is where aurochs depictions can be helpful. Not in detail, but they do transport the overall impression the animals must have made. And if the artwork is bulky, the animal certainly was not gracile.

There is also one sentence in Schneeberger’s report from Jaktorow that provides a clue. He writes that bulls were not as long as the cows, which is the only written account of the body morphology of the aurochs that I am aware of. The fact that he wrote cows being “not as long as the bulls” could indicate that he found the bulls to be somewhat longish. But not necessarily. However, the way the remark is put is interesting.

 

The same goes for the shape of the trunk. With the exception of the Siga verde bull engraving, none of them show bulls with an overly slender waist as in young fighting bulls.

 

Putting the evidence together, I made three sketches based on three different approaches.

This one is based on the photo of a Holstein bull. I manipulated the proportions of the bull on the photo in order to make it fit the Store-damme skeleton:

 

This one is based on the Torsac-dirac skeleton, using ancient depictions such as the one from the Romito cave, Siga verde or Dordogne as a guidance:

 

The last one is based on the Store-damme skeleton:

 

 

While the results are not all too different from each other, I think the lower sketch is the most plausible one, it resembles the Lascaux cave paintings quite well while also matching the anatomy of extant wild bovines. It also resembles the reconstruction of the Sassenberg bull by Tom Hammond in overall morphology. If two artists come to the same result with different skeletons and methods, we might be on the right track. 

 

 

 

What ancient and historical depictions of the aurochs tell us

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 16^th 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.