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The history of the Samoyed dog (Sami huskie)

The history of the Samoyed dog (Sami huskie)

According to all available sources, just like the Molossers, the Samoyed (Sami huskie) is one of the most ancient breeds in the world and the territory of the Russian Empire, called the “Lapp”, now known as the Russian Lapland (Kola Peninsula), was the native land of the Samoyed. From the Lapland the Sami huskie (Samoyed) spread out to the east of the European parts of the Russian North along the shores of the Northern Ocean, all the way to the banks of the Yenisei River and the Taimyr Peninsula, as well as to nearly the half of Siberia.

In 1889 an English zoologist Ernest Kilburn-Scott spent around three months with the Samoyed tribes and imported a Sami puppy from Archangelsk district to England. This puppy was named as “Sabarka”.

The name Samoyed was used to denote the tribes (ancestors of the present day Nenets, Enets, Nganasan and Selkup), which, pushed out of Siberia, by tribes of Mongol origin, came downhill from the Urals and totally annihilated the large populations of peaceful tribes of “PETCHORA”, who populated this large expanse of land. Petchora was a tribe of Chudskoe origin and mostly lived in the caves, dug on the mountain slopes and on the river banks. The Petchora tribes were lot more developed than the Samoyed tribes. In their caves one can find remnants of horns, pieces of pottery, bronze tools and metallic utensils. However, the Petchors could not resist the attacks by ruthless and strong Samoyed tribes, who took over their land — a strip of land about 400 kilometres in width along the shores of White and Kara Seas and all the way to the Taimyr Peninsula. Therefore, even on the old maps of the Russian Empire this area is denoted as the Samoyed area. Currently this area belongs to the Archangelsk district, northern parts of the Republic of Komi and Nenets Autonomous district.

Most probably this is where the additional name of the Sami huskie originates, as used in England and thanks to the Anglo-Saxons it has become the main name of the given breed for the International Canine Federation (FCI) — the Samoyed dog or Samoyed.

Kilburn-Scott was a pragmatic zoologist and he followed his set objectives — breeding the Sami huskie / Samoyed dog in England, therefore he purchased a male dog from the Archangelsk district for the purpose of breeding. The dog was named as “Sabarka” and he bought a female dog of cream colour, called “Whitey Petchora”, named after the River Patchora, which as we know terminates with two tongues, downstream from Naryan-Mar, into the Petchora Sea (name of the south-eastern part of the Barents Sea, located between the islands of Kolugev and Vaichag). One of the most well-known puppies from this pair was a female dog called “Neva”, which was born in 1891. This bitch mated with the imported into England from Siberia male dog called “Blackie” (Finnish — “Musti”), which, despite the name given by the importer, was snow white in colour.these two lines gave birth to the Samoyed called “Olaf Oussa”, which became the first British champion in 1901.

In 1899 the English traveller, Jackson, gifted another 8 Sami huskies from his team to the Kilburn-Scott nursery. This nursery kept breeding new litters, including the female dog called “Ayesha” from Russia. It grew and became world known for the Sami dogs.

It was the mating of the descendants of the “White Petchora” and “Blackie”, who gave birth to a unique Samoyed dog of absolute white colour in England. These dogs became the ancestors of the modern Sami huskies in Finland, which are considered to be the best in the world today and often winn large scale dog shows in Northern America and Canada.