The story of the Cane Corso, coincides extraordinarily with the history of the Italic peoples, in all the splendor and their misery. Unfortunately this race, saved in the last few years from what seemed an inexorable and fatal decline, reaches us with a scanty but still significant historical and iconographic background from which a few enthusiasts have tried to reconstruct the origins of this race.

The etymology of the name Corso is still uncertain. The most credible hypothesis are those which indicate Greek origins: KORTOS = wall and from the Latin: COHORS = guard of the courtyard. Until recently the oldest documentation citing the name of the Cane Corso, consisted of a few poems and some prose dating from 1500. In 1998 the A.I.C.C. or Associazione Italiana Cane Corso published a study on the race which brought to light the military use of the Cane Corso, in 1137 in Monopoli di Sabina (near Rome) , the finding of kennels from the period and the close links between the race and Roman history.

 All of this allows us to consider the Cane Corso, as the principal evidence of an ancestral race which has maintained particular characteristics over the centuries, which take us back in time, not just to the period tied to agricultural economy immediately prior to the industrial revolution, but even further back linking dog fanciers with the great civilizations of the past; the rise and fall of the Roman empire, the middle ages and modern times.

The Cane Corso, has maintained through natural selection over the centuries, the closest possible contact with environment and the roles which man has asked this precious companion to play. We are talking about hard times when the success and survival of a race depended exclusively on their ability to render work, so the choice of raising and keeping a dog was a purely economic one. A responsibility taken which had to correspond to the acquisition of a good or service, nothing superfluous was allowed. The Cane Corso, which we can admire today is the best evidence of the theory which sustains that when a race exhibits certain morphological and behavioral characteristics relating to the work it is required to do, then that race shows harmony of form and balanced character.

The past of the Cane Corso, is not only largely present and alive but also extraordinarily current, as if time had just slipped away. The Corso has conserved from its ancestors the Molossi of Epiro and the pugnaces of Rome, used in war and for fighting in the circus, the aggressive and combative nature necessary for successfully reaching its goal, with no hesitation and with surprising potential force. Through contact with man in social situations he has learned to react only when necessary, becoming an excellent interpreter of human gestures. With these characteristics the Cane Corso, has survived until today. In small settlements in the south of Italy where they have maintained an archaic system of agriculture and a multi purpose dog is an essential partner.

 

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