By  Rafael Malo Alcrudo

All along the third meridian in Europe, from Caucasus to Alentejo, live, and have reached us through the centuries, big wolf-like molossian breeds, traditionally used for the guardianship of flocks and perfectly adjusted to different working conditions, climate and customs of the different countries where they carry out their useful activity. So, such breeds as Anatolian Karabash, Caucasian Sheepdog, Kuvasz, Komondor, Tatra Sheepdog, Maremma Sheepdog, Pyrenean Mountain Dog, Spanish Mastiff, Refeiro del Alentejo, Cao de Serra de Estrela, among others, have reached our days. Inside this group, we meet our breed, which is perfectly fit to the peculiar transhumant system in Aragon. While the transhumant system in the Kingdom of Castile, with very long routes (as the map reproduced on the right side shows) and meticulously regulated by the "Honrado Concejo de la Mesta", produced the breed that is nowadays known as Spanish Mastiff, the Crown of Aragon, with different rules and laws for each of the valleys and districts that made it up, much smaller than those of the nearby Kingdom of Castile, selected the Pyrenean Mastiff. With river Ebro as a symbolic barrier, the influence of the two breeds was relatively poor and their features openly different. The Pyrenean Mastiff shares a large part of his history with the Pyrenean Mountain Dog. We are referring to the north-south division of the Pyrenean valleys which belonged from an administrative point of view to the reigns of Navarra and Aragon and the Principality of Catalonia until 1659, the year when Cardinal Mazzarino, ruler of France, and Philip IV, king of Spain, signed an agreement called "Pyrenean Peace", according to which the whole northern part of the cordillera had to pass under the French rule. From this moment on, the Frenchmen selected their own dog until they obtained the modern wonderful Pyrenean Mountain Dog, while on the Spanish side the traditional, more primitive and heavier, less refined and homogeneous type was kept. Without any doubt, during the international expansion the official love of dogs knew at the end of 19th century and all the 20th century, the two breeds had a very different evolution and luck. While the Frenchmen were making a very good work of selection and promotion of their nice breed (numerous and qualified breeders from other countries followed), in Aragon the Pyrenean Mastiff was simply surviving without any progress. When the last Pyrenean wolf died, at the end of '40s, it was rather senseless to keep a very big dog without a specific duty: the guardianship of flocks from the attack of wolves. Moreover, Spain was in a post-war period, with serious economic problems, so it seemed completely irrational to feed an animal that wasn't useful any more. Fortunately for us, in the '70s, a group of wolves crossed the mountains, so once again it was necessary to use a good sheepdog to protect the flocks. By selecting the most typical subjects, we slowly started to recover our breed. In 1977, the foundation of the Club of the Pyrenean Mastiff in Spain was providential to save our imposing breed from aragon.

All the pictures are taken from "El libro del Mastin del Pirineo" - Guara Editorial