41 Fun Facts About Rottweiler

The Rottweiler is named after a town in which country?

Germany: Rottweil, in the country's south-west, was a busy livestock-trading town, so its drovers needed strong dogs to move the herds and guard their masters.

The Rottweiler's old name, Rottweiler Metzgerhund, translates as what?

Rottweil butchers' dog: the town's butchers bred the dogs purely for usefulness, to herd livestock in their yards and drive cattle to market.

According to the FCI standard, the Rottweiler's origins go back to which era?

Roman times: drover dogs are said to have marched with the legions, guarding the men and driving the cattle that fed them.

What replaced the Rottweiler's droving job in the mid-19th century?

Railways: once cattle travelled by train the drover dogs had no work, and the breed came close to disappearing before its 20th-century comeback.

In 1910, after official trials, the Rottweiler was formally recognised for service with which body?

The police: when forces tested breeds for service in the early 1900s the Rottweiler proved highly suitable, which gave a dog that had lost its droving work a new career.

Which guard dog, bred around 1890 by a tax collector for protection, is thought to carry Rottweiler blood?

Dobermann: Louis Dobermann also kept the local dog pound, so he could pick the toughest dogs to breed from, and the Rottweiler is thought to have been among them.

Despite its cattle-driving past, the Rottweiler is shown in which American Kennel Club group?

Working: the group gathers breeds developed to guard property and assist people, which is where the AKC has classed the Rottweiler since recognising it in 1931.

On market trips, cattle dealers are said to have tied what around their Rottweilers' necks?

Their money purses: the takings travelled home around the dog's neck because few robbers on the road would try their luck with a Rottweiler.

Beta, a tough Rottweiler, is second-in-command of a villain's talking-dog pack in which Pixar film?

Up: Beta is lieutenant to pack leader Alpha among explorer Charles Muntz's dogs, whose collars turn their thoughts into speech until a squirrel distracts them.

Which pope did critics nickname 'God's Rottweiler'?

Benedict XVI: as Cardinal Ratzinger he ran the Vatican's doctrine office, and critics coined the name for his readiness to silence dissent.

Which bite does the breed standard demand of a Rottweiler's 42 teeth?

Scissor bite: the upper incisors closely overlap the lower ones like scissor blades, while an overshot or undershot mouth disqualifies a dog under both the FCI and AKC standards.

What colour must a Rottweiler's nose always be?

Black: the FCI standard lists a pale or spotted nose, which it calls a butterfly nose, among the breed's faults, and the AKC standard also demands black every time.

How does the breed standard describe a Rottweiler's eyes?

Almond-shaped, dark brown: the AKC standard calls yellow eyes 'bird of prey' eyes and a serious fault, and the FCI standard disqualifies them outright.

In which 1986 John Hughes comedy does the family Rottweiler chase away a snooping school dean?

Ferris Bueller's Day Off: dean Ed Rooney sneaks into the Bueller house hunting for the truant Ferris, and the dog chases him off twice, the second time for good.

In a correctly built Rottweiler, the deep chest should reach down to which joint?

The elbow: the standards want a chest about half the dog's height, and the elbow sits midway between withers and ground, so a correct chest just reaches it.

Historically, where was a Rottweiler's tail traditionally docked?

At the first or second joint: only a vertebra or two was left, but the FCI standard now describes a natural tail reaching to the hocks, while the AKC accepts docked or undocked.

Under the FCI standard, a Rottweiler born with a natural bob tail is treated as what?

A disqualifying fault: a dog born with a stumpy tail is barred from the ring along with kink and ring tails, even though tails docked just as short were long the breed's norm.

What is the Rottweiler's required gait in the show ring?

Trot: both the FCI and AKC standards call the Rottweiler a trotting dog, and the FCI lists sluggish action at the trot as a severe fault.

Besides herding, which of the Rottweiler's old jobs survives as a trial sport today?

Pulling carts: the dogs once hauled loads to market for their owners, and carting trials keep that skill alive as a sport.

Rottweilers living in hot climates may be missing what?

The undercoat: the AKC standard accepts that climate affects how much a dog carries on its neck and thighs, yet a total lack of it is still a serious fault in the ring.

The Rottweiler standard calls for a small tan spot in which position on the head?

Over each eye: both the AKC and FCI standards ask for the spot, and the AKC counts excessive markings as a serious fault.

What shape are the two rust marks on a Rottweiler's chest?

Downward-facing triangles: the AKC standard asks for one on each side of the chest, and a dog with no markings at all is disqualified from the ring.

A 2008 survey of breed club members found Rottweilers more aggressive than average towards whom?

Strangers: the same owners rated the breed below average for fear of unfamiliar people, a bold rather than nervous pattern the authors linked to breeds with protection and herding jobs.

Legend says the Rottweiler's drover ancestors followed marching armies north over which mountain range?

The Alps: the dogs are said to have driven and guarded the army's cattle over the passes, then stayed and mixed with the local dogs around Rottweil.

The Rottweiler is thought to share ancestry with the Appenzeller and Entlebucher mountain dogs of which country?

Switzerland: these Sennenhund farm dogs probably bred with the incoming drover dogs, and the likeness is plain, though a Rottweiler must show none of their white chest markings.

Rottweilers often compete in which sport that tests tracking, obedience and protection work?

Schutzhund: a dog must pass all three phases at one trial to earn a title, so a bold guard that cannot follow a scent trail goes home with nothing.

Rottweilers are especially prone to which cancer, which often shows up as an unexplained limp?

Osteosarcoma: the tumours usually grow in the long bones of the legs, which is why a limp with no obvious cause sends a Rottweiler owner to the vet.

Rottweiler puppies are often fed slow-growth large-breed food to lessen the risk of which joint disorder?

Hip dysplasia: the ball and socket of the joint fail to fit and grind instead of gliding, and growing too fast makes it worse in a breed already prone to it.

Rottweilers are among the breeds at higher risk from which often fatal viral disease of puppies?

Parvovirus: for reasons not fully understood the breed both catches it more readily and dies of it more often than most, so finishing the puppy vaccine course matters.

Under Ireland's restricted-breed rules, who may hold a Rottweiler's lead in a public place?

Someone over sixteen: the 1998 rules want a handler capable of controlling the dog, so they also demand a muzzle and a strong lead no longer than two metres.

Who created Good Dog, Carl, the mostly wordless picture books about a babysitting Rottweiler?

Alexandra Day: she modelled Carl on her own Rottweiler, Toby, and lets the pictures do the telling as he looks after a little girl named Madeleine.

Which 1976 horror film has a menacing Rottweiler at the Thorn home and a cemetery pack?

The Omen: Damien's nanny spots a lone dog in the grounds at his fifth birthday party just before tragedy strikes, and a whole pack later drives Thorn out of an Italian cemetery.

What did Jake, a rescue Rottweiler, do in 2009 to earn an RSPCA bravery award?

Chased off a woman's attacker: hearing screams on a Coventry common, he ran the man off and stood guard over her until police came, and the attacker was later jailed for four years.

Which HBO series is cited as portraying Rottweilers in a positive light?

Lethal Weapon 3 and the 1998 film Half Baked are also named as sympathetic portrayals.

The Rottweiler belongs to which family of dogs?

Mastiff: the FCI files the breed with its Molossian, mastiff-type dogs, yet its standard also lists looking too heavy and mastiff-like as a severe fault.

What colour must a Rottweiler's gums be, according to the standard?

Black, or as dark as possible: the AKC standard likewise prefers dark pigment inside the mouth and counts a wholly pink mouth as a serious fault.

How are a Rottweiler's ears described in the FCI standard?

Pendant, triangular, set high: lying forward close to the cheeks, the ears make the skull look broader, an effect both the FCI and AKC standards point out.

Who reintroduced Rottweilers to Britain in 1953?

An army vet: Captain Roy Smith brought a breeding pair home from his posting abroad, and more imports followed until the breed, barely seen in Britain before the war, was established.

At its American peak in the 1990s, the Rottweiler ranked second in AKC registrations behind which breed?

Labrador Retriever: in 1992 the Rottweiler shoved the Cocker Spaniel, America's favourite of the 1980s, down to third, but it never caught the Lab.

A Purdue study of exceptionally long-lived Rottweilers linked reaching age 13 to delaying which routine procedure?

Spaying: females that kept their ovaries longest were the likeliest to outlive the breed's usual nine or ten years, which challenged the old assumption that spayed females live longer.

Which herding breed tops Stanley Coren's dog intelligence ranking, in which the Rottweiler places ninth?

Border Collie: Coren ranked breeds by how fast they learn a new command and how reliably they obey it, and his top ten, the Rottweiler included, need fewer than five repetitions.