Chapter 12 Ten Camelidae

A good helper who is difficult to control ★image Traditionally, the camel in the Middle East has been portrayed as two conflicting images: on the one hand, it has always been a symbol of humbleness in this world, stoically bearing the burden imposed on it, showing a quiet and noble temperament; On the one hand, at least the dromedary was once regarded as a symbol of lust.Lust and violent temper are always associated with camels.On the subject of temper, Belle.Beryl Rowland quotes in her book Animals with Expression: A Guide to Animal Symbolism: A camel curses its parents when going uphill and its creator when going downhill.

In an ancient Indian legend, a man who tried to molest a beautiful girl was later transformed into an ugly camel as punishment.Indian superstition holds that by burying a camel bone under a threshold, ghosts will not be able to enter the house.In North America, camelids died out before the arrival of humans; the camel is said to be a kind of horse devised by someone. In Peru, llamas and camels are revered as sacred animals in the alpine regions.Legend has it that llamas are often seen in the caravans that gallop only at night, as the caravans move the treasures of the earth from one place to another.In some legends they are led by a llama herder, but in others the llamas perform the work of the gods alone, without any human intervention or guidance.According to Andean legends, those who hunt or injure vicuna have dire fates.

★Celidae Camelids have been found in the wild from the Arabian Peninsula to Mongolia, and across vast areas of southern and southwestern South America.There were camelids in North America during the Pleistocene and earlier, but today only fossils remain.Before humans came to Earth, camelids were found in many parts of the world.The ancestors of guanacos in southern Argentina, and the ancestors of Bactrian camels in Inner Mongolia, have both reached the middle of the earth. Humans have had two seemingly opposing effects on camelids.One is that the original wild type is all gone.The range of wild camelids is shrinking due to hunting by humans or habitat usurpation by humans and their increasing livestock.The second effect is just the opposite.Camels have been taken to places where they were not even in their heyday.Now camels have penetrated deep into Africa and crossed the northern part of the African continent to reach the Atlantic coast. There are also traces of camels in Australia, Europe, and Asia, and the number of llamas in North America is gradually increasing; Two different needs than imagination.

Camelidae really originated in North America.At first they were about the size of a hare (Eocene), and later about the size of a sheep (Oligocene).By the Pleistocene, they were very large, much larger than their descendants.During the Ice Age, they appear to have moved westward, crossing the then narrow Bering Strait via land bridges.Some descendants of camelids descended to South America, where another evolutionary process developed.Later, perhaps due to climate and other factors, animals such as camels, early horses, countless ground sloths, dire wolves, and saber-toothed cats in North America became extinct.

The four living camelids in South America are the guanaco, vicuna, alpaca and llama, both of which are considered wild animals.Since the time of the Inca Empire, humans have often surrounded wild camels, trimmed their fine wool, and released them back into the wild.Since early humans made no attempt to control their breeding, they were not domesticated either.Later, Jesuits tried to breed them, but were unsuccessful and expelled from Peru.Recently, some people have devoted themselves to this work. Perhaps we can predict that the skinny camel will be the next domesticated animal (perhaps the elk is its competitor), so that the skinny camel's fine wool will be available for luxury. product market needs.

It is generally believed that llamas and alpacas, two true domestic animals, are descendants of guanacos that were domesticated by humans.The llama is the only pack animal in the western hemisphere that was produced by the aborigines domesticating the native llama ancestors; the alpaca is not used as a pack animal, it provides wool and meat, and the wool produced is the most delicate of all natural fibers One of the woolen materials, its meat tastes between pork and mutton, and its quality is extremely good.Since the author keeps alpacas as pets, the thought of alpacas being used as food makes me uncomfortable.As for llamas, they are sometimes used as food.

Until about 2,000 years ago, the dromedary camels in the Arabian region were still wild animals, but now all the local camels are domestic animals, and their descendants are in a semi-bred or semi-wild state.In some parts of Kenya, camels are often seen feeding in roadside clearings, perhaps mixed with domestic animals and sometimes with ungulate wild animals.At first glance, they might appear to be wild, but closer inspection reveals bridles, bells, decorated collars, or other signs of human domestication.With the exception of a few camels that have escaped for many generations, it is generally believed that there are no so-called wild dromedaries left in the world.Thus, the so-called wild and wild words have only a semantic rather than a zoological meaning, and this has been the case since about the birth of Christ.

The Bactrian camel is a wild animal originally distributed between the Central Asia of the former Soviet Union and Inner Mongolia.However, the Bactrian camels currently found in the wild may, like the dromedary, be just escaped camels.It is said that a real wild herd of more than 20 camels has been discovered.It has been suggested that about three hundred truly wild Bactrian camels still exist in the foothills near the remote Gobi Desert, but no one has been able to confirm this.In fact, apart from the skinny and guanacos of South America, there may no longer be any truly wild camels in the world.

Interestingly, the fetus of a dromedary has two humps, one of which is absorbed in the mother's body before birth.This leads us to speculate that the dromedary is just a tamer type of the original wild Bactrian camel, and that it should be considered a subspecies, or even a variation due to geographical differences.In Turkey, hybrids of camels are often produced.They usually have only one hump, but are slightly heavier than the dromedary. ★The breeding process Where camel husbandry took place remains a mystery.Dromedary husbandry may have originated in central or southern Arabia, in fact, probably in only one of the two places, probably three to four thousand years ago.Unlike other domestic animals, domesticated and wild dromedary camels are difficult to distinguish from their remains because there are no significant differences.After dromedary camels were raised by humans, they soon spread westward to the Nile River Valley, crossed North Africa, spread eastward and southward to India, and spread northward to Palestine, Syria, Iran, Iraq and Turkey, and from there to Expand outside.In ancient Greece and Rome, dromedary camels appeared in Europe, but in small numbers, and finally appeared in large numbers in Eurasia.

The history of the Bactrian camel is murkier.They are undoubtedly a wild animal with a very wide range of activities.The earliest descriptions of the coexistence of Bactrian camels and humans date back to four to five thousand years ago.Since the skeleton is not reliable enough, the artistic depiction provides more clues. Where the Bactrian camels were first actually raised by humans is most likely unknown.The exact location is difficult to pinpoint because of the large number of possible locations and their spread over vast distances.Taming camels is such a good idea, so once someone domesticated camels, the wave swept across all places suitable for camels and accessible by land.Nomadic or semi-nomadic peoples may have been associated with the husbandry of both types of camels, but their history, like their distant caravans across distant mountains on moonless nights, is vague and illegible.We seemed to hear human voices and the tinkling of wooden bells, but we were not sure if we really did.

★Initial association Camels are very agile animals with enormous energy and more vitality than humans.For a hunter on foot (thousands of years before the invention of gunpowder), camels were elusive game; not only do they have a keen sense of smell, but like many animals that roam the open plains, they also have excellent eyesight of.In addition, they are always in packs, in other words, each animal in a group has many eyes, ears and noses doing defensive work at the same time. There are many kinds of groups formed by Bactrian camels, some are single groups, some are all composed of adult female camels and newborns, and there are also mixed groups formed by a male camel with a female camel and young camels under two years old.Since camels can live up to fifty years, they have ample time to learn all the survival skills.A resourceful old camel knows all the ways to save his female and offspring from harm.It is very difficult to sneak up on these groups in open places. Unless the camel caravan comes to the flat land with lush grass or bushes, it is difficult to drive them away even with fire attack, not to mention the burning effect of deserts and other dry areas. not good. The Bactrian camel's birth period is between mid-March and the end of April, and its pregnancy period is very long, up to 440 days.Dromedaries give birth anytime between February and early May.Baby camels can stand up and run a few days after birth, and if humans want to sneak up on them, they have only a small chance.We can imagine that if there was a valley or something where pregnant female camels came to give birth, they might have some vulnerable points before, during, and after giving birth.However, raiding camels alone is not enough to sustain human activities for a whole year; this method consumes far more energy than it gains, so it is not feasible.Humans have to figure out ways to gain more than lose and help humanity survive. Camels have a weakness that seems to be related to water.Although they can live for months on desert plants and brackish water (even salt water), they eventually get to drink from rivers.Even though wood was scarce (and still is) for making traps where camels wandered, and humans themselves needed wood for fuel, they could still make traps out of wood and place them where wild camels drink.In conclusion, around thousands of years before BC, nomads have known to use water as bait to lure camels, control them and exploit their potential.From the perspective of human needs, this is a big step forward. ★value If people did use water to trap camels near water sources, these camels breed in places that humans could hardly reach on their own.Humans may have settled near deserts earlier than camels did, but they certainly did not live in deserts. The last rainy period of the Pleistocene was extremely wet, and groundwater levels in the Near East and southern Mediterranean were probably the highest ever.However, the last post-glacial period (which began about 10,000 years ago) was very dry, and agricultural havoc ensued.Lacking knowledge of land use and attempting to own all the goats and sheep in the world, fledgling local farmers and herders have put themselves in a position of doom.When their livestock ravages a place, nothing grows there anymore.For most higher life forms, goats are terminators.As long as it has been there, nothing will remain there, except for the camel.The camel is the only animal used by humans that is slightly better than the goat. It can feed on the worst grass and lead humans on long journeys without water.With camels, humans can travel safely and smoothly between oases and water sources. At first, the camel was a kind of wild game that provided human meat, leather, bones and wool.Of course, it's unlikely that no one ever thought of using wild camels as pack animals, but it's more likely that someone brought young camels home to raise them with the intention of slaughtering them later, and the young cowboys thought they were fun. And hopped on a humpback ride, and thus the concept was born.Thanks to this concept, caravans were born, and humans were finally able to go places they couldn't go before, and at the same time, because camel caravans were able to meander across continents and subcontinents, humans could also trade goods or exchange ideas.With camels transporting batches of goods and passengers, the trade of important items such as resin and rosin was expanded, and the spice trade also relied on the transport of camel caravans.With camels, nomads gained economic and political power that they did not have when other tribes settled. Sometime between 500 and 1000 BC, the northern Arabians invented the camel saddle, which greatly improved the efficiency of camels for carrying goods and people.For a short time, camels were as important to city dwellers as to nomads.In addition to their role in trade, camels are also necessary for war. They inspire people's desire for exploration and conquest. They symbolize important wealth and status, and promote cultural exchanges between the East and the West. It can only be done by sea.The ship of the desert is not just a play on words, that is the role that the camel has always been and still is.The husbandry and use of camels is arguably one of the greatest achievements of human creative culture. We have to walk through arid regions or actual deserts to understand what the camel originally meant to humans.Impassability alone is not an adequate description of this land.In many places, roads are almost completely useless: moving sand continuously forms rows of hills all over the land, and walking dunes are a very apt description.The heat of the day, the cold of the night, the sandy river flowing under the feet, the uncertain water source, and the distance between the oases, without the speed, endurance and load of the camel, human beings would not be able to survive here.In the desert, life with or without camels is a reality on two different levels; the benefits of owning camels are obvious, but the status of those who do not have camels will surely decline in a short time. Camels pull our wagons and wagons, draw water from wells, drag plows, thresh wheat, and also provide the strength needed to grind linseed for oil and operate irrigation equipment; Everything that Cong did, Camel did. Although there are no so-called breeds of camels, at least some types are distinguished in India, the hill camel and the flat camel, which in turn are divided into river and desert varieties.The river type (it is neither a species nor a subspecies) is strong and sluggish, and is an ideal animal for carrying goods; the desert camel is the most highly rated, and it is more like a thoroughbred. It is the fastest camel and has physical strength. abundant.In India and elsewhere, camels were used primarily as pack animals, then as milk and wool animals, and finally as fur and meat.In many regions, camels are slaughtered only for highly ceremonial events.In China, although people's knowledge of Bactrian camels is thousands of years earlier than dromedary camels, both types of camels are currently used locally. There are certain negative perceptions of camels, which have made camels a secondary choice in places where oxen, horses and donkeys are well used.Camels don't taste good, even for those who love them.Bulls are not only loud and dangerous (a stout Bactrian bull can weigh almost three-quarters of a ton); they are not particularly smart, not very sensitive, have a bad temper and are difficult to train, and are slow to reproduce .Young camels have little practical use until they are four or five years old.Unless it's a really, really dry area, camels are susceptible to certain diseases, including pernicious anemia, a deadly insect-borne disease, anthrax, rabies, and a highly contagious form of camel pox.Camels are not an easy or particularly likable animal to keep and sometimes they don't get along well with other animals in close quarters, but the fact that they can do things that other pack animals can't is enough to make them a great animal. Builders of cultures and civilizations, and one of the most important domestic animals in human history. ★South America For a while, it was generally believed that vicuñas were descended from guanacos and alpacas were descended from skinny camels.However, it is now generally and increasingly agreed that the ancestors of both domestic animals, the llama and the alpaca, were guanacos, that the llama evolved as a cargo animal with coarse hair, and that the smaller alpaca had fine wool. , but not strong enough to be a good pack animal. All evidence points to Peru as the place where guanacos were herded by humans, probably three to four thousand years ago.At present, there are already clues to follow about the completion of this period of breeding process.Wild camels are herded along narrow tracks built along stone walls into corrals, where they are sheared before being released.Humans may have managed guanacos in this way, without releasing them, and thus bred llamas and alpacas. Interestingly, it has been said that the American continent did not start raising animals long after the process of raising animals in the Eastern Hemisphere was completed. The reason may be that the visitors from the East brought the concept of breeding to Peru in the lowlands of the western coast of America, so the concept It became popular in the local area and spread to the highlands, and the concept of livestock breeding continued to develop.However, we can discuss for or against this argument until we have a better understanding of the earliest ocean travel.At the same time, there seems to be no good reason to deny the contribution of Peru and her Incas. The vicuña is not big and not very strong. Its maximum load is only about 100 pounds (about 45.4 kilograms). Therefore, the caravan carried by vicuñas is usually very large, and consists of one or two A herder is responsible for controlling dozens of llamas, but this may have been the case since humans began using animals to carry goods.How do one or two men and maybe one or two little boys manage so many animals?The answer is only one word: dog.Humans brought llamas into their lives from the cold outdoors and raised them about 8,000 to 10,000 years ago, when dogs were already domestic animals.However, none of the domestic shepherd dogs of South America were derived from native canids.The dogs of the Incas were by no means descended from maned wolves; could they have been brought by travelers across the Pacific, then?And if North America is an independent occurrence of human domestication of canids, how did Stone Age Americans come to Peru by sea or land?It should be impossible for them to have done so; those travelers would have come from farther than North America, and traveled across the ocean in complex ways that we don't fully understand. There are two different species of alpacas in Peru: the Huacaya and the suri, but both belong to the same species.Although the wool quality of both is very good, the Sully's coat is longer and more popular.How many different types vicuña can be divided into (such as ccara and lanuda) is still uncertain, but the preferences of various places are usually used as the classification basis. Research is ongoing.In addition, huarizo is a hybrid of alpaca and vicuna, and pacovicuna is a hybrid of alpaca and llama, but neither of these hybrids have performed well economically. outstanding. The influence of camelids on human history is largely determined by geographical accidents.In the Middle East and Asia, the influence of the two camels of the Eastern Hemisphere, the dromedary and the bactrian camel, was far-reaching; spread across thousands of miles in all directions, the degree of cultural exchange produced was considerable, and this exchange was material. A feat of both knowledge and knowledge that changed the course of civilization forever.Wherever camels took humans, their goods, and ideas, a new world opened up there, even after technology enabled humans to establish regular seafaring routes. In contrast to South America, llamas and alpacas are restricted by the impenetrable Amazon rainforest to the east and the vast Pacific Ocean to the west, so their development is extremely restricted. Therefore, the brilliance of the Inca culture has never been comparable to that of the Maya or Aztecs. World contacts, not to mention other more distant cultures.Moreover, because of their isolation, these cultures are so vulnerable to even the slightest contact with the outside world that diseases and parasites wipe them out before these people have had a chance to develop immunity.In the end, the survivors become the captives of other cultures, and their greatest achievements, cramped and tailored to their own needs, crumble with them, only to reappear centuries later and become a tourist attraction. If such an argument is a judgment too harsh, it is also the judgment of history.It is worth pondering, if the camelids in the American continent, like the camelids in the eastern hemisphere, could pass on these few isolated high-level cultural achievements, and make these equally brilliant cultures communicate with each other, what would be the different results?And what if the Western Hemisphere was spared the relentless onslaught of ocean-going travel?Another, more ironic fact is that while the camel is still of great importance in some places, on a global scale, the caravan has been replaced by the jetliner.Despite this, the number of people raising camels continues unabated, and the fuel needed for airplanes lies under the sands that camels have traveled through for thousands of years, in that vast sea of ​​crude oil.