Pre-history
The Sumerians, a non-Semitic people that descended from the steppes, settled in Mesopotamia in the fifth millennium BC, and had artifacts by 2000 BC. depicting the long-bodied, long broad flat heads, and square muzzles typical of the Alaunt. The Sumerians supplemented animal husbandry with big game hunting.
Following were the Assyrians and their Mastiffs with the titles "Biter of the Foe" and "Catcher of the Enemy", on a number of artifacts denoting the dogs' function as war-dogs.
The Molossus descended into Epirus in about 1200 BC, also from the north. However, their artifacts did not resemble the Mastiff prototype, as they had a long nose of a narrow type, and a long mane. Varro, however, described a herding dog of Epirus which was white, large headed, and slightly undershot, used to defend sheep and goats. The Alans were fractured into groups, of which some had returned West at various times in various locations. One group of Alans arrived in what is now Albania in the fifth or sixth centuries BC. Molossis of Epirus is located in Southern Albania. It is most plausible the Alaunt gave rise to the fighting dogs of the Molossi, which were introduced to Britain by Roman Invasion in 55BC. The Alans provided cavalry for Rome and in 50AD, 5,500 Alans were sent to Britain to guard Hadrian's Wall. Thus, the Alaunt genetic template most plausibly gave rise to the British Pugnances as fighting dogs which English Mastiffs and Bulldogs descend from.
The nomadic pastoralists migrations were presented by the Kurgan Theory/Kurgan Hypothesis in 1956 by Marija Gimbutas.
The titles "Biter of his Foe" and "Catcher of the Enemy", the supplemental use in big game hunting, and the tending of cattle and livestock describe the exact type dog brought by the Spanish Conquistadors and settlers to the Americas. The same functional titles of Assyrian Mastiffs were used to denote the Mastiff war-dogs of the Spanish Conquest as Perro de Ayuda and Perro de Presa, respectively.
Spain and north of the Caucasus were linked by the "Beaker Folk" who made articles of bronze and spread them widely through Europe starting around 2000 BC. This era was said to be of sea-fearing more extensive than any until the 15th century AD. Thus, the earlier spread of Alaunts/Mastiffs throughout the Mediterranean, at least 900 years before the Phoenicians established their first colony on the Iberian Peninsula in 1100 BC, is most plausible.
One can thus conclude the race of dogs known as the Alaunt originated with the race of people referred to as the Caucasians of Eurasian pastoral life, long advanced in domestication and not from the hunter/gatherer. Perhaps that's why the word "Mastiff" is said to trace to Latin meaning 'domesticated'. In 550 BC, the Alaunt given to Cyrus by the King of Albania was found meek when matched with a bull, however a fighter of lions and elephants.
The advancement of the nomadic herdsmen of the North-West Caucasian tribes appeared in the Late Stone Age, east of the Danube River. The Sumerians spoke a language reminiscent of Ural-Altaic. Kortlandt postulated a branch of Ural-Altaic was changed by a Caucasian substratum in the earliest Pre-Indo-European phase in the seventh millennium, north of the Caspian Sea, and this is supported by archaeological evidence.
The Alaunt, known as the light bodied Mastiff, developed in the grasslands along with the Pre-Indo-Europeans, north of the Caspian Sea. The Alans, like their ancestors, were nomadic pastoralists of the grasslands and therefore did not breed Mountain Dogs. However, the genetic template of the Alaunt prototype has long been used in countless other breeds throughout Indo-Euro-Asia.
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