By Sunny Weber

British Queen Victoria was a passionate dog lover, and it was during her reign that formalized dog shows began as an aristocratic sport. Previously, dogs had been bred by humans for work, which involved temperament, trainability, and physical endurance.  Victorian aristocrats bred dogs for aesthetically “fashionable” looks, not practical attributes, which began in earnest during the Victorian era.

Victorian Lap Dog

This trend continued into the reign of Victoria’s son, King Edward. During the early to mid-1900s, specialized breeding for “lap dogs” ran concurrently to that of country working dogs. Consequently, from the 1880s to around the turn of the last century,  the phenomenon of the pampered Victorian show dog brought life-on-a-leash to city dogs, although working dogs still ran free and proliferated in country environments.

Today, some dogs still work as, for example, protection, herding, drug sniffers, and assistance dogs. But most dogs live as unemployed pets. By the 1950s, Western dogs who had been living in barns, yards, and sheds became pampered pets in upper- and middle-class human homes.

Despite the many subsequent breeds–mixed and pure–one historical working dog has become extinct and lost to time: the Turnspit Dog. 

Taxidermied Spit Dog in a Wales Museum

In 16th century Britain, small dogs were placed in a large hamster wheel-like structure that was attached to the wall in a manor’s kitchen. The dogs were forced to run and as they did so, the wheel rotated a spit—a long metal rod that pierced a chunk of meat as it rotated and cooked over an open fire. The life of a turnspit dog was inhumane and cruel by today’s standards.

Turnspit dogs were owned by the wealthy. Lower class people could only afford small amounts of meat, which they stewed. Wealthy connoisseurs slow-roasted their luxurious and fatty meats over an ever-burning fire in the belly of the castle kitchen. Before unfortunate mongrel dogs were drafted into service, the fireplace spit was turned by the lowliest person in the kitchen staff, usually a boy who turned the iron spit by hand for hours. Often the child stood behind a bale of hay, wetted for protection from the heat. But in the 16th century, the boys gave way to specially-bred dogs, called the vernepator cur, Latin for “the dog that turns the wheel.” The first mention of spit dogs is in 1576, in the earliest book on dogs ever written.

During the 1500s, this monotonous, hot, dangerous task was increasingly the chore of the turnspit dog. The “kitchen dogs,” were small, weighed between 15 to 25 pounds and measured 8 to 12 inches tall. They had short legs, long backs, stocky bodies, long snouts, and short coats of a variety of colors.

The wheels were attached high on the wall, so the dogs did not overheat and faint. A glowing coal was thrown into the wheel to make the dog run. The turnspit dogs were treated poorly and required to work for hours, with few breaks for food and hydration. It was common for people to keep a couple of dogs so that when one tired out, another could take over. The dogs also powered fruit presses, butter churns, water pumps, and grain mills.

By the middle of the 19th century, use of the turnspit declined due to improvements in technology. By the end of the 19th century, people began to turn away from cooking over an open fire entirely, in favor of using gas-powered heat in ovens and stoves. Turnspit dogs were never socialized or treated humanely and often had poor temperaments and so were not considered desirable pets, although supposedly Queen Victoria rescued and kept three. Consequently, the kitchen dog type went extinct.

There are few records of turnspits being employed in America. Hannah Penn, the wife of William Penn, founder of Pennsylvania, wrote to England requesting a dog wheel for her turnspits be sent to her. Benjamin Franklin’s Pennsylvania Gazette had advertisements for turnspit dogs and wheels for sale. And historians speculate that a turnspit was active in the kitchen of the Statehouse Inn in Philadelphia. Dogs were used in a few large hotel kitchens in America to turn spits.

In the 1850s, the founder of the ASPCA (Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals), Henry Bergh, worked to pass laws prohibiting dogs in spit wheels. When he inspected hotels after the law was passed, he was dismayed to find the job was passed on to small black children. Hence, he also founded the New York Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children (NYSPCC).

Henry Bergh, (1811-1888). US Humanitarian and reformer; founded ASPCA 1866; co-founded ASPCC 1875.

In 1750 there were turnspits everywhere. By 1850 they had become scarce, and by 1900 they had disappeared.

Although the turnspit dog is extinct, their nearest living canine relative is probably the Welsh Corgi, the favorite dog of the late Queen Elizabeth II, the great-granddaughter of Queen Victoria.

As Western cultural animal welfare evolved into the 2000s, the very existence of spit dogs seems unduly cruel and inhumane, but many species of animals of their time suffered in treatment by people. Fortunately, modern laws continue to be enacted to protect our vulnerable companions in all countries.