Question

The earliest animal to have been domesticated by man was most likely the

• A. Horse
• B. Pig
• C. Dog
• D. Cow

Answer 1

Answer: (C)

Dog

Dogs were the first domesticated taxa. When and where dogs were first domesticated has vexed geneticists for the past 20 years and archaeologists for many decades longer. Identifying the earliest dogs is difficult because the key morphological characters that are used by zooarchaeologists to differentiate domestic dogs from their wild wolf ancestors were not yet fixed during the initial phases of the domestication process. The range of natural variation among these characters that may have existed in ancient wolf populations, and the time it took for these traits to appear in dogs, are unknown. Today, all zooarchaeologists support the proposition that dogs were not only the first domestic animal but that the appearance of dogs significantly predates the origins of domestic plants and early agriculture. Horse, pig, and cow are domesticated later to dogs.

So, the correct answer is option C.