Sloughi - HISTORY

The Sloughi is originally the Sighthound of the Berber people. Its exact origins date too far back to be completely known and remain speculative. Representations of African Sighthound-like dogs date back to the 8th-7th millennium BC, and Ancient Egypt's artifacts tell us how valuable straight-eared and lop-eared smooth Sighthounds were in those days. The lop-eared smooth Egyptian Sighthound originated possibly from Asia but was also part of tributes to the Pharaohs from Nubia (South of Egypt). This ancient hound resembles today's Sloughi, Azawakh, smooth Saluki, and smooth Afghan, and it is impossible without any genetic study to know whether it was identical with any of these breeds or a breed of its own, or whether it was the ancestor of all lop-eared Sighthound breeds. Recent mitochondrial DNA studies confirm that the Sloughi is an ancient breed embedded in Africa, and show that the Sloughi has no more relationship to the Saluki it is often confused with, than to other breeds such as Scottish Deerhound, Dachshund, Samoyed, Basenji or Boxer.

In its countries of origin (Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia and Libya), the Sloughi is the only dog treated as family and allowed into the tent. For the Berber it is a noble animal compared to the other impure local dogs or "kelb." This is illustrated by such expressions as "Aada machi Kelb; aada Sloughi" or "this is not a dog, this is a Sloughi." In these countries, the Sloughi is the only canine bred and selected with the same care as an Arabian horse, and its owner would go without his own blanket to provide his Sloughi with warmth in the cold desert nights. Puppies were often breast fed by Bedouin and Berber women to help nursing bitches. A lost Sloughi was mourned like family. Sloughis were often decorated with jewelry and amulets. Their legs are sometimes ritually branded by their owner, and the ears are cropped up to prevent them from being torn to pieces when hunting jackals.

It was in the mid 1800s that the first detailed descriptions of the breed and its role in the North African societies reached us through the books of General Daumas, then stationed in Algeria. Other reports followed by travellers from other countries to North Africa. The breed was imported first by France and the Netherlands at the end of the 1800-beginning of the 1900s, before the Saluki and the Afghan Hounds breeds were clearly indentified there. The first standard was put together in both countries, the first official standard being published in 1925 by the French Sighthound Association. Because France occupied Algeria, the Sloughi was considered a French Sighthound breed until the 1970s when Algeria gained independance. Morocco then became the country representing this breed within the FCI.

Political upheavals disrupted highly sophisticated breeding by leading families. Because of a law introduced during French occupation which prohibited hunting with sighthounds and resulted in the shooting of these dogs on sight, and epidemic rabies, the Sloughi population was decimated. In spite of efforts in Europe and North Africa, the Sloughi is still not very common and its breeders have an important responsibility in the conservation of this ancient breed.

In the United States, the first Sloughi was imported in 1973.