Near Eastern Mouflon

Mouflons are small wild sheep and the ancestors of our domestic sheep.

Mouflons are small wild sheep and the ancestors of our domestic sheep.

Around 10,000 BC, in the area of the Fertile Crescent, where the countries Turkey, Iran, Iraq and Syria are today, the domestic sheep evolved from the mouflon. Today, we can only speculate how this happened. Probably the undemanding mouflons, which would eat almost any plant, were kept in pens at first. Man reproduced the tamest animals with characteristics considered important, and the result was the first domestic sheep.

Sheep did not have wool then, they were still so-called hair sheep. Later people discovered that the undercoat can be used to make clothing. So they reproduced animals with more undercoat and finally managed to breed wool sheep.