Lord Morton’s Mare
Lord Morton’s Mare was once an often noticed example in the history
of evolutionary theory.
.jpg) |
|
Lord Morton's Quagga, by Jacques Laurent Agasse
(Courtesy of the Royal College of Surgeons). |
In 1820,
George Douglas, 16th Earl of
Morton, F.R.S., reported to the President of the Royal Society
that being desirous of domesticating the quagga, he had bred an
Arabian chestnut mare with a quagga stallion (
1),
and that subsequently Lord Morton bred the same mare with a white
stallion and found that the offspring had strange stripes in the
legs, like the quagga. The Royal Society published Lord Morton's
letter in its Philosophical Transactions, 1821. In the same issue
"Particulars of a Fact, nearly similar to that related by Lord
Morton, communicated to the President, in a letter from Daniel
Giles, Esq." reported that in a litter of a black and white sow, by
a "boar of the wild breed, the chestnut colour of the boar strongly
prevailed" in the piglets, even to the third subsequent litter.
These circumstantial reports seemed to confirm the ancient idea
of telegony in heritability: Charles Darwin cited the example in On
the Origin of Species (1859) and The Variation of Animals and Plants
under Domestication (1868). The concept of telegony, that the seed
of a male could continue to affect the offspring of a female,
whether animal or human, had been inherited from Aristotle and
remained a legitimate theory until experiments in the 1890s
confirmed Mendelian inheritance. Biologists now explain the
phenomenon of Lord Morton's mare using dominant and recessive
alleles.
Notes:
1. A quagga was a relative of the
zebra, now extinct.
Any contributions will be
gratefully accepted
Errors and Omissions
|
|
The Forum
|
|
What's new?
|
We are looking for your help to improve the accuracy of The Douglas
Archives.
If you spot errors, or omissions, then
please do let us know |
|
If you have met a brick wall
with your research, then posting a notice in the Douglas Archives
Forum may be the answer. Or, it may help you find the answer!
You may also be able to help others answer their queries.
Visit the
Douglas Archives Forum.
|
|
We try to keep everyone up to date with new entries, via our
What's New section on the
home page.
We also use
the Community
Network to keep researchers abreast of developments in the
Douglas Archives. |
|
|
|
|
|
2014 Clan Douglas Gathering
|
Consideration is being given to holding a Clan Douglas
Gathering in Scotland in the summer of 2014. If this is something that
you would be interested in being part of, then please visit our
Community Network and make your views known.
You can tell us when you think the Gathering should be held, where it
should be held, and events and activities that you would like to see as
being part of the Gathering.
|
