Turnspit Dog · extinct type
Outside FCI
ok. 38 cmHistorical type · reconstruction
at the withers
at the withers
- Mass
- Źródło muzealne nie podaje zakresu liczbowego masy
Turnspit Dog · extinct type — size comparison
The Turnspit Dog was a small, short-legged working dog known from historic British kitchens. An extinct type, its appearance is reconstructed from descriptions,
Silhouette comparison
Height
Ground withersReference values · details in the profiles
HeightScale in cm
010203040
approx. 38 cm
The scale compares the named dimensions. View direction and measurement points are given for each animal.
Turnspit Dog · extinct type — size comparison — facts and sources
The Turnspit Dog was a small, short-legged working dog known from historic British kitchens. An extinct type, its appearance is reconstructed from descriptions, engravings and a preserved specimen. It had an elongated body suited to fitting inside a small wheel. Its name referred chiefly to its work.
The dog ran inside a wooden wheel connected to a roasting spit above a hearth. Its movement turned the meat, replacing kitchen servants’ manual labour. In larger homes dogs could take turns. As mechanical kitchen devices spread during the nineteenth century, demand disappeared, followed by the population itself.
Work in a hot kitchen was prolonged and arduous. Historical evidence reveals considerably more about this use of dogs than their everyday temperament. It provides no basis for assigning a uniform modern behavioural profile. A material trace survives in Whiskey, a preserved dog held in a museum in Abergavenny, Wales.