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BORDER COLLIES – A BREED AS OLD AS TIME

Today our breed expert, Carol Price, reflects on where Border collies really came from – and just how far back their history really goes

Most of us cannot remember a time when Border collies weren’t part of the whole British rural and farming landscape. In real life. In paintings. In grainy old photos showing devoted working dogs forever rooted to their handler’s side. And Border collies still remain the most versatile and remarkable sheepdogs the world has ever seen.

But how long have these dogs really been among us, and followed us through history? For although the modern Border collie, as we know it today, is thought to have originated in northern England, and more specifically with Adam Telfer’s Old H**p (1893-1901 – and pictured here) setting the basic genetic template for how future working collies should look and behave, we can forget that there were also dogs BEFORE H**p. From which he himself also descended.

For the modern Border collie’s ancestors were always a ‘type’ of herding/droving dog, long before they became more formally recognised, in the 20th century, as a distinct ‘breed’.

EARLIER HISTORY
There are many who believe this type of dog actually goes back over two thousand years, to Celtic times, and existed not just in Britain and Ireland, but also across Europe. In my illustration here you will also see a dog who looks remarkably like a Border collie in a 15th century painting by the Italian artist Pisanello.

It is just that Britain and Ireland – due to their climate, and terrain - went on to develop a far more widespread and prolific sheep farming culture. Which in turn led on to the ever greater genetic refinement of these ‘collie type’ dogs for working purposes.

EARLIER STILL
If you like you can go back even earlier still, to when our modern collies’ ancestors were not even domesticated dogs at all, but wolves still on the path to evolving an ever closer connection with humankind. A process that may well have taken many thousands of years. The wolves in question were also more likely to have come from smaller sub-species once prolific across Western Europe, like the Italian wolf (see illustration). Rather than the bigger, bulkier species found in places like Canada, North America and Russia.

This distinction is important, as these smaller wolves had – as they still have today - a far lighter and more agile build, together with longer legs and narrower feet. All of which made them able to navigate rougher or more challenging terrains far faster and more efficiently. Exactly the kind of attributes that we prize in sheepdogs today.

If modern sheepdogs do also share some common past ancestry with species like the Italian wolf, this would also tie in with the belief some share that it was the Romans who brought the earliest ancestors of our sheepdogs to Britain, and most specifically dogs with that more unique characteristic of the mesmerising ‘eye’.

WHY HISTORY MATTERS
Of course there may be many who think that the past history of any dog breed is always open to speculation - which it is. Or those who think it is less important either way. But others like myself think it is. Who love knowing that the bloodlines of all my dogs go right back over 120 years to Old H**p. Bloodlines that have continued in them, unbroken, through two world wars and all manner of human and societal change along the way. What I also think is that you can never truly understand any dog, or breed, until first you know where they come from.

All text © Carol Price 2026

More on the whole evolution of the Border collie appears in the first book of the author’s BREED APART trilogy – SECRETS OF THE WORKING MIND.
Carol Price books on Border collies:
In the UK from: https://performancedog.co.uk/?s=carol+price In the USA from: https://www.dogwise.com/ # and In Canada from https://4mymerles.com/collections/books In Australia from: https://gameondogs.com.au/ And in the Netherlands and Belgium from: https://mediaboek.nl/border-collies-a-breed-apart-book-1.html

The books are also available through most Amazon outlets

Quentin past baby that lives in San Antonio Texas 2 years old.