Hunting wild aurochs

WHERE do cows come from? It seems like a strange question, but what were the ancestors of today’s bovines?

The answer is the wild auroch, a species which existed from the Middle Pleistocene (774,100 years ago to 129,000 years ago) through to the year 1627AD, when the last known auroch died from natural causes in the forests of Poland.

The bulls had a shoulder height of up to 180cm and cows up to 155cm. They also had huge horns of around 80cm and weighed around 1000kg. They were widely described as dangerous due to their aggression, speed, strength and fearlessness. They stood their ground to defend against threats.

It is likely that they evolved in Asia, migrating north and west, eventually appearing in Western Europe, North Africa, the Indian subcontinent and East Asia.

There is a theory that early humans may have followed the aurochs into Europe from North Africa as they were an important source of food.

Their distribution gradually reduced during the Holocene (the most recent geological era spanning the last 11,700 years) due to habitat loss and hunting.

Aurochs appear in Paleolithic cave paintings, Neolithic petroglyphs, ancient Egyptian reliefs and Bronze Age figurines, and their horns were often used as trophies or drinking horns…

Image: An auroch on the Ishtar Gate of Babylon, dated to 575 BCE, reconstructed with original bricks at the Pergamon Museum in Berlin.