14 DAY TRIAL // Excavations carried out in Egypt in 2010 and 2011 led to the discovery of several hundred mummified dogs. By the looks of it, one of these pooches was not alone at the time of its death. What's more, its “buddies” stayed with it throughout the centuries.
Thus, researchers say that, upon closer inspection, it became clear that this dog was teeming with bloodsucking parasites at the time of its death. Besides, their remains are noticeable in the animal's coat and its right ear.
Live Science tells us that, as far as the specialists who have had the chance to examine the dog mummy can tell, some of the parasites that troubled this dog during its lifetime were the common brown tick and the louse fly.
Commenting on these findings, researcher Jean-Bernard Huchet with the National Museum of Natural History in Paris pointed out that, “ Although the presence of parasites, as well as ectoparasite-borne diseases, in ancient times was already suspected from the writings of the major Greek and Latin scholars, these facts were not archaeologically proven until now.”
Given the fact that the dog was merely a pup when it died, specialists suspect that the parasites it carried made it sick and that this brought about its premature end.