Dogue de Bordeaux (French Mastiff)
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40 free Dogue De Bordeaux (French Mastiff) trivia questions with answers — trivia quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
The Dogue de Bordeaux, better known to many as the French Mastiff, is one of France's oldest breeds and one of its most imposing: a powerful, muscular dog with a famously serious expression. Behind that face is a long story that runs from medieval hunts to Hollywood. This quiz turns the best French Mastiff fun facts into questions: where the breed comes from and how it got its name, the jobs it once did, how it came close to disappearing, what the official standard demands of its build, coat and movement, and the health quirks owners should know. A handful of questions follow the Dogue onto the big screen and into famous households. It suits owners, breed fans, dog-show followers and anyone who fell for Hooch at the cinema. Every answer comes with a short explanation, so you will finish knowing far more about the Dogue de Bordeaux than when you started.
30 of 40 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Which actor played the tidy detective stuck with Hooch, a Dogue de Bordeaux, in a 1989 cop comedy?
Tom Hanks
Tom Hanks called the shoot one of his most demanding, because he had to react on camera to whatever his canine co-star decided to do.
Q 02The Dogue de Bordeaux is named after a city on the Garonne famed as a global capital of what?
Wine
Wine made the city's fortune, and since 2016 Bordeaux has devoted a whole riverside museum to it, the Cité du Vin.
Q 03Which part of the Dogue de Bordeaux is claimed to be the largest of any dog, relative to body size?
Head
Head size is the breed's hallmark: on a male, the skull measures about as much around as the animal stands tall at the shoulder.
Q 04Which Barcelona superstar welcomed a Dogue de Bordeaux puppy named Hulk into his family in 2016?
Lionel Messi
Lionel Messi announced the puppy as a new member of the family in January 2016, and Hulk soon grew big enough to make his owner look small.
Q 05What nearly wiped out the Dogue de Bordeaux before breeders gave it a fresh start in the 1960s?
The two world wars
The two world wars left the breed threatened with extinction, until a small group of French breeders set about rebuilding its foundation stock.
Q 06Which big cat did Raymond Triquet see in the Dogue de Bordeaux when he set out to revive it?
Lion
A lion is what Triquet saw in the rare breed, and he went on to write the modern standard that still defines how it should look.
Q 07Which messy habit does the American Kennel Club warn every French Mastiff owner to expect?
Drooling
Drooling comes with the territory: owners find strings of slobber on furniture, floors and even walls, yet fans insist the breed is worth it.
Q 08The French Mastiff's flat face leaves it especially prone to which of these dangers?
Overheating
Overheating is the risk because dogs shed body warmth mainly by panting, and the same shortened airway makes anaesthesia riskier too.
Q 09What happens to Hooch, the Dogue de Bordeaux, at the end of the 1989 comedy Turner & Hooch?
He is fatally shot
He is fatally shot while tackling the villain, but the closing scene introduces a puppy that looks and acts exactly like him.
Q 10The 'mastiff' in French Mastiff comes via Old French 'mastin' from a Latin word meaning what?
Tame
Tame is the root sense: Latin 'mansuetus' described an animal accustomed to the hand, quite a contrast with the breed's forbidding looks.
Q 11Which Happy Days star was fired as director of the 1989 film Turner & Hooch after thirteen days?
Henry Winkler
Henry Winkler, the Fonz himself, later joked that he had got along better with the dog than with the film's leading man.
Q 12Which streaming service revived Turner & Hooch in 2021 with five French Mastiffs sharing the lead?
Disney+
Disney+ ordered twelve episodes, with Arnie, Hammer, Obi, Cyd and Mya taking turns as the dog, then cancelled the show after one season.
Q 13Besides hunting and fighting, the Dogue de Bordeaux historically served which French tradesmen?
Butchers
Butchers used the powerful dogs to watch over their cattle, at a time when the type was hardly known beyond its home region.
Q 21Which jaw alignment, a disqualifying fault if absent, does the French Mastiff share with the Boxer?
Undershot
Undershot jaws set the lower incisors in front of the upper ones, and a Dogue whose mouth lacks the trait cannot win in the show ring.
Q 22What are the loose throat folds of a Dogue de Bordeaux called, a feature also seen on zebu cattle?
Dewlap
Dewlap is the term, and the standard wants it well defined from throat to chest without hanging to excess.
Q 23The French Mastiff is a molossoid breed, a label taken from the Molossians of which ancient land?
Greece
Greece was home to the Molossians of Epirus, whose huge dogs were famous throughout antiquity and even appeared on the tribe's silver coins.
Q 14In which city did the Dogue de Bordeaux make its show debut in 1863, at France's first dog show?
Paris
Paris staged the show in the Jardin d'Acclimatation, where the dogues were entered under the very name they still carry today.
Q 15The 'dogue' in Dogue de Bordeaux is a French word borrowed in the 14th century from which language?
English
English supplied it: 'dogue' is simply the word 'dog' in French dress, and it first appeared in France at the end of the 1300s.
Q 16Which coat colour, in shades running to deep mahogany, is the only one allowed for a French Mastiff?
Fawn
Fawn in any shade passes, but a brindle or solid chocolate coat disqualifies a dog from the show ring outright.
Q 17Which eye colour is a disqualifying fault in a Dogue de Bordeaux under its international standard?
Blue
Blue eyes rule a dog out of the ring, as do bulging ones; the standard asks for oval eyes in hazel to dark brown.
Q 18What was the day job of Raymond Triquet, the Frenchman who led the Dogue de Bordeaux revival?
Teacher
Teacher by trade, Triquet fell for the rare breed, bred influential dogs of his own and helped define the modern standard.
Q 19Which American Kennel Club group, home to the Great Dane, includes the Dogue de Bordeaux?
Working
Working Group status arrived in 2008, when the Dogue became the 158th breed the club had recognised.
Q 20The standard describes deep, mobile ropes of what on either side of a French Mastiff's brow furrow?
Wrinkles
Wrinkles frame the face symmetrically and shift as the dog's attention changes, though heavy bulldog-style folds count as a severe fault.
Q 24Which large game animal did hunters in 19th-century France pursue with the Dogue de Bordeaux?
Boar
Boar was the quarry, a dangerous one: the breed's likely medieval forerunner was praised for holding its bite harder than three sighthounds.
Q 25In the mid-19th century, the Dogue de Bordeaux was hardly known outside which French region?
Aquitaine
Aquitaine was the breed's stronghold, and its Bordeaux type went on to eclipse rival French dogues bred further afield.
Q 26Which term describes flat-faced breeds such as the French Mastiff, the Pug and the Bulldog?
Brachycephalic
Brachycephalic dogs have skulls shorter than is typical for the species, a look bred on purpose that often brings noisy, laboured breathing.
Q 27Small patches of which colour are allowed only on the chest and toes of a French Mastiff?
White
White is tolerated only on the forechest and feet; on the tip of the tail it becomes a severe fault, and on the body it disqualifies the dog.
Q 28Which Jungle Book character shares a name with an influential French Mastiff bred by Raymond Triquet?
Mowgli
Mowgli de la Maison des Arbres, a kennel name meaning 'of the house of the trees', was among the dogs Triquet bred as he rebuilt the breed.
Q 29Viewed from above or in front, the French Mastiff's skull and muzzle together form which shape?
Trapezoid
Trapezoid is the standard's own word, with the long side running across the top of the skull and the short one along the underjaw.
Q 30The tip of a French Mastiff's low-carried tail should reach, but never hang below, which joint?
Hock
Hock level is the limit for a tail that starts very thick, hangs at rest and lifts when the dog moves, without ever curling over the back.