Fox 'may have been prehistoric man's best friend'

Early man may have preferred the fox as a pet rather than dogs, new findings suggest.

Researchers analysing remains at a prehistoric burial ground in Jordan have uncovered a grave in which a fox was buried with a human, dated thousands of years before dogs were kept as companions.

The University of Cambridge-led team believes that the unprecedented case - in which the remains of the animal and the man were then partially transferred to an adjacent grave - points to some kind of emotional link between human and fox.



Hunt: Man may use dogs to hunt foxes now, but the University of Cambridge research suggests early man kept foxes as pets thousands of years before their canine relatives

Their research suggests that the fox may have been kept as a pet and was being buried to accompany its master, or mistress, to the afterlife.

If so, it marks the first known burial of its kind and suggests that long before man hunted foxes using dogs, our ancestors were keeping them as pets.

The cemetery, at Uyun-al-Hammam, in northern Jordan, is about 16,500 years old, which makes the grave 4,000 years older than the earliest known human-dog burial.

However, the close relationship between man and fox was probably short-lived. Writing in the journal, PLoS One, published today, the researchers say it is unlikely foxes were ever fully domesticated and, despite their early head start, humans took to the more companionable dog for pets as time went on.

Studies carried out on foxes suggest that they can be brought under human control, but that the process is not easy because they are skittish and timid - so perhaps for that reason, the researchers suggest, dogs ultimately achieved 'best friend' status among humans instead.

Pet: The research, published today, suggests the fox may have been kept as a pet and was being buried to accompany its master, or mistress, to the afterlife.

Dr Lisa Maher, from the Leverhulme Centre for Human Evolutionary Studies, University of Cambridge, said: 'The burial site provides intriguing evidence of a relationship between humans and foxes which predates any comparable example of animal domestication.

'What we appear to have found is a case where a fox was killed and buried with its owner. Later, the grave was reopened for some reason and the human's body was moved.

'But because the link between the fox and human had been significant, the fox was moved as well, so that the person, or people, would still be accompanied by it in the afterlife.'

The research focused on the contents of two graves at Uyun-al-Hammam, which is on an ancient river terrace in the small river valley of Wadi Ziqlab. The first graves there were opened in 2005 and the site has been a rich source of information about the so-called early Epipalaeolithic period, 16,500 years ago.

The Cambridge-led team spotted a connection between two adjacent graves, one of which was opened more recently than the other. In the first, they identified the remains of two adults, probably a man and a woman.

The man had been buried earlier than the woman, and alongside him were the skull and humerus - or forelimb bone - of a fox, as well as other grave goods.

When the second grave was opened, the researchers found human remains that may have belonged to the same man, and the skeletal remnants of what was, they believe, almost certainly the same fox.

The fox skeleton was complete apart from its skull and right humerus - which is exactly what had already been found in the adjacent grave. Further studies indicated that the remains were those of a red fox.

The movement of the body parts is believed to be highly significant, they say. If the human body is the same in both cases, then none of the other grave goods except the fox were considered worth moving, strongly suggesting that the fox had some sort of special relationship to the human.

Other such cases are very rare. Many of the next earliest involve dogs, including one site in Israel where a woman was buried with her hand resting on a puppy, but even they are about 4,000 years younger than Uyun-al-Hammam.

Dr Jay Stock, also from the Leverhulme Centre at the University of Cambridge, said: 'The very first evidence of dog domestication in the Near East involves a burial of a puppy with a human.

'It's easy to imagine that the similarly-sized fox was also viewed by prehistoric people as a potential companion in the same way. Clearly, it had significant social status.'