Heather Vance
The Greater Swiss Mountain Dog is a large, heavy-boned, and very physically strong dog, the oldest and largest of the four breeds, such as the “Mountain Dog”, originally from the Swiss Alps.
Most likely, dogs of the Greater Swiss Mountain Dog breed and the Small Swiss Mountain Dog-Captain would have been singled out as a separate breed, if at the end of the 19th century the Swiss Cynological Society had not engaged in the selection of Bernardines (the ancestors of today’s St. Bernards). The similarity between the Greater Swiss Mountain Dogs and the Bernardines at that time was very great, but the interest in the Bernardines was fueled by stories about the dog Barry, who saved a lot of people, and as Bernardines only red and white dogs were selected.
