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Kushki and Khelat Afghan Sheepdogs
(NOT Afghan Hounds)
Khelat is clearly nothing like an Afghan Hound, but now, at least, with thanks to Jess Ruffner-Booth we know what he looked like. Some examples of his entry in show catalogues is shown below
These two dogs were NOT Afghan Hounds. So you might ask "why" did I include them in this section on early Afghan Hounds? Because, way back in the 1880's people didn't know what an Afghan Hound was (the name Afghan Hound wasn't in common/standard usage, the breed had all sorts of other names as well as Afghan Hound). In England people knew of Mr. W K Taunton who was famous for being an importer/fancier/exhibitor/breeder of Foreign and Exotic breeds of dogs. In fact, eventually W K Taunton did actually import true Afghan Hounds and exhibit them. So whilst Kushki and Khelat are not Afghan Hounds, likely at the time some people may have been confused and latterly assumed them to be Afghan Hounds.
I just thought it opportune to include them, explaining that they were not Afghan Hounds, if for no other reason than "clarity" and to avoid any future confusion between them and the early Afghan Hounds.
For convenience we'll refer to Clifford Hubbard (The Afghan Hound Handbook, 1951) for commentary on Kushki and Khelat
"Mr. W. K. Taunton was a fancier who was keenly interested in exotic breeds and who never failed to help rivet attention on any newcomer. As soon as the Afghan or Barukhzy Hound began to compete against his Huskies, Dingos, Hairless Dogs and other "dog-oddities" he obtained several himself, and was probably the first to exhibit an Afghan Sheepdog. At the Warwick and Maidstone shows of 1884 he won prizes with the black and white "Khelat" and again at the Warwick show of 1888. "Khelat" has been referred to as an Afghan Hound but was really an Afghan Sheepdog, as the reproduction of the drawing by R.H.Moore in A.Croxton Smith's Everyman's Book Of The Dog. 1910. clearly reveals (opp p.250). Shaggy, and with a docked tail, he is nothing whatever like an Afghan Hound, but very like an old-fashioned working type of Old English Sheepdog (the rather unbeautiul and not too tall kind seldom seen to-day). The following year, 1885 saw another Afghan Sheepdog, the Rev. A Carter's "Kushki" being exhibited. But Taunton did have genuine Afghan Hounds as well as Afghan Sheepdogs and he showed a nice bitch called "Motee" at Bristol in 1886, where she won the first prize in the Foreign Dog class beating her kennel mate "Empress of China" (Chinese Edible Dog - The Chow Chow). Taunton's "Roostam" (pedigree unknown) and "Motee" became the property of Mr. T.R. Tufnel who bred from them the famous fawn "Rajah II' IN December 1883.
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