Our history
Our history
On top of the world, between mountains reaching up to the sky, lived a white headed animal god, called Sako. Sakko gave birth every year to two offsprings, one with and one without wings. The previous one was looking for its food on its own, while the latter was fed by its parent in its nest.
Once, when Sakko was bringing up a particularly strong wingless sapling, he grabbed it and flew with it down into the valley. According to the legend that is how the Lhasa Apso reached Tibet.
Tibet is the country of monks and monasteries. Its nation arose supposedly from the matrimony of a mountain witch and a male monkey. Their most spread religion is the lamaism or so called lama faith, which is the slightly altered form of buddhism. It is a very peculiar belief, where the demons and magicians get along with the animals excellently. The latter were deemed holy and invulnerable.
Buddha ( around 550-480 BCE), the big founder of the religion, was in a direct contact with the lions, respectively with the leonine animals. The “ Enlightened” was constantly accompanied by “little lions” who turned big in the moment of danger.
In the lamaism, the rebirth of a human, the “reincarnation” may as well take place in the shape of an animal. That is the reason why in the monasteries lot of lionine dogs were kept because the monks were in complete agreement , that they were reborn in their bodies. Later they were even started breeding these small, long-haired dogs. They were referred to as Lhasa Apso.
We know five original Tibetan breeds: the enormous Tibetan Mastiff, the Tibetan Spaniel, the Shih Tzu, the Tibetan Terrier and the Lhasa Apso.
The Lhasa apso were also given the name “Apso Seng Kyle”- standing for barking lion dog or they were called “Seng Tru”, meaning lion cub. They were monastic dogs as well and since they were quite alert and brave, they were handed over duties beside the giant Tibetan mastiffs that included watching over the house.
Lhasa Apsos were bred by the Tibetan “King of God”, the Dalai Lama, and it was perceived as a special gift, when somebody received one.
Due to its shape resembling a lion, its colour also had to resemble. Because of that the lion colour is considered to be the most precious one, which is sort of brownish-red. The very first specimen arriving overseas were nearly all patchy and black. The leonine appearance is enhanced by the males having a dark mane on their neck.
Of course Lhasa Apsos arrived at first in Europe to England. In 1901 a lady called Marjorie Wild brought in these kind of dogs from India. The breed happened to take part in exhibitions several times at the beginning of the century, however at that time only as Tibetan Apso, not distinguishing itself from the Shih Tzu. In 1934 the British Kennel Club approved of the Lhasa also breed description (standard). The breed received its name after Lhasa, the capital of Tibet.
