Greyfriars Bobby

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Memorial to Greyfriars Bobby
The memorial in front of the pub
Gravestone for Greyfriars Bobby. Translation of the inscription: Greyfriars Bobby, died January 14, 1872 at the age of 16. Let his loyalty and devotion be a lesson to us all. Erected by the Scottish Canine Society, unveiled by HRH the Duke of Gloucester on May 13th 1881.

Greyfriars Bobby (* 1855/6, † January 14, 1872) was a Skye Terrier in Edinburgh , Scotland , who became known for his fabulous loyalty to his master.

history

Bobby belonged to the policeman John Gray and after his death in 1858 is said to have spent the remaining 14 years of his own life at Gray's grave in the churchyard of Greyfriars Kirk in the old town of Edinburgh. He only left his seat for meals that were served to him in the nearby "Coffee House". According to contemporary reports, onlookers regularly gathered in front of the cemetery at lunchtime to watch the dog on his daily walk to the coffee house, to which he set off after the one o'clock cannon was fired. Bobby finally died at the age of 16 and was also buried in Greyfriars Kirkyard - secretly, because no animals are actually allowed to be buried there, but in this case any other place would have been unthinkable.

It can be assumed that the original story of Bobby's loyalty was embellished in the course of its expansion to its present size, taking up an old literary theme: Even in Homer's Odyssey , the dog Argos is ascribed a similar loyalty to his master Odysseus for decades.

The historian Jan Bodeson from Cardiff University argues that the whole story is a hoax to promote tourism. The dog observed was two different animals, neither of which John Gray had ever heard of.

Edits

Several books and films are about Greyfriars Bobby, including a novel by Eleanor Stackhouse Atkinson (1912) and based on Walt Disney feature film Greyfriars Bobby - The True Story of a Dog ( Greyfriars Bobby: The True Story of a Dog , 1961). The Lassie film Lassie in Not is also based on the touching story.

In 2016 the composer Sven Hellinghausen wrote the orchestral piece “Greyfriars Bobby - The Story of an Unconditional Love” for a symphonic wind orchestra.

statue

Shortly after Bobby's death in 1872 , the sculptor William Brodie created a life-size statue that placed a memorial to the loyal dog in front of a pub in front of the Greyfriars Kirkyard cemetery in Edinburgh. Furthermore, a grave stone with the inscription "Let his loyalty and devotion be a lesson to us all" was in front of the church at the site, it is believed at the Greyfriars Bobby's grave ( Let's be his loyalty and devotion to all of us a lesson built). Dogs are also remembered on cemetery tours of the Greyfriars Bobby Walking Theater or the Greyfriars Kirkyard Trust .

Individual evidence

  1. ^ "The Story of Scotland's Most Faithful Dog" ( Memento from April 5, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Dogs in the News , July 4, 2001. Researched April 2, 2011
  2. ^ Forbes Macgregor: Greyfriars Bobby: The Real Story at Last . Gordon Wright, Edinburgh, Scotland 1990, ISBN 978-0-903065-69-6 , pp. 47 .
  3. ^ Forbes Macgregor: Greyfriars Bobby: The Real Story at Last . Gordon Wright, Edinburgh, Scotland 1990, ISBN 978-0-903065-69-6 , pp. 56 .
  4. ↑ Jan Bodesson: Greyfriars Bobby . Amberley, London 2011, ISBN 978-1445603940
  5. ^ Greyfriars Bobby tale is wrong claims Cardiff historian . In: BBC News , August 5, 2011

literature

  • Eleanor Atkinson: Bobby / A dog that you won't forget , translated and re-edited by Heide Schulz, Buchverlag König, Greiz 2016, ISBN 978-3-943210-91-0

Web links