Lagotto Romagnolo

The Lagotto Romagnolo is an Italian breed of dog. It is a traditional breed of the formerly extensive marshlands of the Delta del Po, in the eastern part of the Emilia-Romagna region of Italy, where it was used as a gun dog, specifically as a water retriever. After the drainage of large areas of wetland habitat in its area of origin in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, it came to be more often used to hunt for truffles. In the twenty-first century it may be kept as a companion animal.

Origin	Italy
Traits Height Males 43–48 cm Females 41–46 cm Weight Males 13–16 kg Females 11–14 kg
Kennel club standards Ente Nazionale della Cinofilia Italiana standard Fédération Cynologique Internationale standard
Dog (domestic dog)

History

The Lagotto originated in the once extensive marshlands and lagoons of the Delta del Po, in areas such as Comacchio and Ravenna, in the eastern part of the historical Romagna region of Italy.

Dogs showing some similarity to the modern Lagotto appear in various paintings from northern Italy. One is the small dog behind the legs of Ludovico III Gonzaga, Marquis of Mantua, in the fresco on the west wall of the Camera degli Sposi in the Ducal Palace of Mantova – now in Lombardy – painted between 1465 and 1474 by Andrea Mantegna. Another, from almost two hundred years later, is shown in the portrait by Paolo Antonio Barbieri of his sister and his brother – the painter Il Guercino – with a dog and a cat.

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  Andrea Mantegna, Camera degli Sposi, Mantova, west wall, detail (about 1470)
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  Paolo Antonio Barbieri, portrait of his sister and brother (before 1649)

Its traditional function was as a gun dog, specifically a water retriever, bringing shot game back to dry land or to punts on the water. since the drainage of large areas of wetland habitat in its area of origin, it is now more often used to hunt for truffles. It has been known since the sixteenth century, but did not become widespread until the nineteenth.

It was provisionally accepted by the Fédération Cynologique Internationale in 1995, and received full acceptance in 2005. In 2018 the Ente Nazionale della Cinofilia Italiana recorded 2207 new registrations.

Characteristics

Two-year-old bitch

The Lagotto is of small to medium size, rarely over 50 cm at the withers, powerfully built and of rustic appearance. It is roughly square in outline, the body length more or less equal to the height. The coat is thick, wool-like and tightly curled into ringlets. It may be completely off-white, or off-white with orange or brown patches or roaning, or solid orange or brown either with or without white markings.

A Lagotto usually lives for about fifteen years. Neurological disorders that have been identified in the breed include cerebellar abiotrophy and idiopathic epilepsy.

Use

Truffle hunting

The Lagotto was formerly used principally as a gun dog, specifically as a water retriever. After the drainage of large areas of wetland habitat in its area of origin in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, it came to be more often used to hunt for truffles. In the twenty-first century it may be kept as a companion animal.

Further reading

• Eija H. Seppälä, Tarja S. Jokinen, Masaki Fukata, Yuko Fukata, Matthew T. Webster, Elinor K. Karlsson, Sami K. Kilpinen, Frank Steffen, Elisabeth Dietschi, Tosso Leeb, Ranja Eklund, Xiaochu Zhao, Jennifer J. Rilstone, Kerstin Lindblad-Toh, Berge A. Minassian, Hannes Lohi (2011). "LGI2 Truncation Causes a Remitting Focal Epilepsy in Dogs". PLOS Genetics 7 (7): e1002194. doi:10.1371/journal.pgen.1002194.