Early humans turned wolf pups into the first domesticated dogs

Humans and dogs share a very old story, but the plot is changing. Instead of wolves taming themselves on the edges of camps, a growing body of evidence points to people taking very young wolf pups and raising them.

This shift matters because it ties the origin of dogs to choices our ancestors made, not just to wolves hanging around. It casts domestication as a long, hands-on relationship that began deep in prehistory.

Raising pups for generations

The human-initiated model argues that hunter-gatherers routinely collected pre weaned pups, socialized them in camp, and, over generations, favored the friendliest animals.

The human initiated model is supported by research from the Australian Research Centre for Human Evolution at Griffith University (ARCHE), the Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences (RBINS), the University of Sydney, and the Australian National University (ANU). 

Their work suggests that early mobile foragers in Late Pleistocene Eurasia may have routinely taken very young wolf pups from wild dens.

These ancient humans socialized the pups within their camps and gradually favored animals that were more suited to living alongside humans.

A present day anchor helps frame the scale of human-dog relations. About 70 percent of the world’s dogs roam freely, showing most still live outside pet households.

Dogs lived with humans early

Dog-like skulls from the Pleistocene push the association between people and canids well before the advent of farming.

One striking case comes from Goyet Cave in Belgium, where a dog like cranium dated to roughly 36,000 to 31,700 years ago shows features unlike typical wolves.

Another specimen from Razboinichya Cave in Siberia, about 33,000 years old, has been described as an incipient dog and later supported by ancient DNA work.

These early finds do not replace the well-known Late Glacial dog from Bonn-Oberkassel, Germany, buried with humans about 14,200 years ago. However, they do show that dog-like canids lived alongside people long before villages appeared.

People tamed friendly wolf pups

Wolves are born blind and only open their eyes around two weeks, a window when handling can shape later behavior in powerful ways.

Modern work also shows that hand reared wolves can form strong attachments to human caregivers, a trait that would have made pup raising workable for ancient foragers.

This approach differs from the old self-domestication story, which leans on scavenging at trash heaps. It posits active care, repeated selection, and, eventually, breeding among tamer canids close to camp.

Food and friendship leave traces

Biochemistry and tooth wear offer a check on the behavioral story. Stable isotope analyses from the Gravettian megasite of Předmostí show that dog-like canids ate more reindeer and muskox.

Wolves, by contrast, consumed more mammoth – a pattern suggesting humans fed dogs leaner cuts and bones.

Dental microwear texture analysis at the same site finds distinct chewing signatures between wolf and dog like groups, again hinting at different food sources and roles near people.

These data do not prove domestication on their own. They show that some large canids associated with humans were eating differently and using their teeth differently than nearby wolves.

Pup raising traditions continue

Ethnography from Australia adds a living analogy. Aboriginal communities long practiced taking dingo pups from dens, nursing them in camp, and later letting many disperse as they matured. It’s a cycle that could still shape the genetics of nearby free living canids over time.

This pattern answers a key objection. Even if many socialized animals left camp at breeding age, people often took new pups from dens in the border zone between camps and wild territories. Over time, this practice could shape which pups became companions the next season.

Over many generations, that habit can favor lines with calmer temperaments and stronger human bonds without a fenced kennel or a permanent village. It is a cultural practice with biological consequences.

Wolf pups were early companions

Archaeology also records emotional closeness before formal domestication. A 16,000-plus-year-old grave in Jordan holds a human burial with a red fox, signaling that some foragers kept carnivores as companions or ritual partners well before agriculture.

Scale helps the process. Seasonal aggregation camps with abundant food would have increased contact with socialized canids, boosted the odds of nearby den re-use, and made it easier to find pups again.

Seen together, the timeline in the bones, the chemistry in the collagen, the wear in the teeth, and the logic of pup raising hang together.

People did not wait for wolves to wander in, they went out each spring and chose their companions.

The study is published in the journal Frontiers in Psychology.

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