ABSTRACT
Historical studies of the domestication and diffusion of livestock, such as Boettger (1958), Zeuner (1963) or the contributors to Mason (1984a) often give Africa somewhat short shrift. This is especially the case for so-called “minor” species; i.e. any species other than cattle, sheep and goats. The absence of iconographie or literary records and the patchy coverage of archaeology has often led researchers to conclude that little can be said. However, methods do exist of filling these historical lacunae, in particular the use of linguistics and comparative ethnography. The recent development-oriented literature on ruminant breeds summarized in Blench (1993) provides synchronic distributions of major species and races.
