{"id":53104,"date":"2015-06-18T09:08:36","date_gmt":"2015-06-18T09:08:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.scotclans.com\/?p=53104"},"modified":"2015-06-18T09:08:36","modified_gmt":"2015-06-18T09:08:36","slug":"greyfriars-bobby-the-lie-behind-the-legend","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/project1-m9gb2xku8.live-website.com\/?p=53104","title":{"rendered":"Greyfriars Bobby-The Lie Behind the Legend"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Greyfriar's<\/a><\/p>\n

Greyfriars Bobby<\/a> is known around the world as the epitome of man’s best friend, not budging from his masters grave from the day of his burial in 1858 up until his own passing in 1872. The story is well known in Scotland and around the world, through several books and films, particularly the\u00a01961 Walt Disney film Greyfriars Bobby: The True Story of a Dog. Bobby even inspired the small monument above, interestingly Edinburgh’s smallest listed building, which was originally built as a drinking fountain with an upper section for humans and a lower section for their dogs.<\/p>\n

However new evidence goes to support the idea that Bobby was a hoax cooked up by local businessmen to keep the tourists flowing and as such the coin from their pockets.<\/p>\n

Dr Jan Bondeson, a senior lecturer at Cardiff University,\u00a0has uncovered evidence that there were in fact two Bobbies from 1858 to 1872 and that neither of them belonged to the man buried in Greyfriars cemetery whose grave they sat by. \u00a0Dr Bondeson has saidthat he ‘smelt a rat\u2019 whilst researching the story of the famous dog for a book on amazing dogs throughout history. \u00a0His research shows the first dog was in fact a stray which wandered into the nearby Heriot\u2019s hospital, now George Heriot’s School,\u00a0and was then taken to the graveyard.\u00a0James Brown, the curator of the cemetery, treated him so well that he stayed, and locals assumed he was mourning his dead master. This worked in the favour of Brown and a local restaurant owner,\u00a0John Triall, with donations coming in thick and fast to Brown and many of the visitors stopping for food in Triall’s restaurant.<\/p>\n

His research goes on to show that this dog passed of old age around 1867 and was replaced by Triall and Brown in an effort to keep the visitors flowing. \u00a0Artwork and pictures of Bobby show a distinct change in 1867.<\/p>\n

\"Greyfriars<\/p>\n

The first was an elderly, tired dog who wasn\u2019t much to look at, and the second a lively terrier who ran around and fought other dogs.\u00a0This would also go some way to explain the longevity of Bobby, who lived a long 16 years, when even today 10 to 12 years is a good life span for a Skye terrier. Dr Bondeson has also stated that these two dogs where joined by many others. Visitors would think such strays were mourning their masters and leave them scraps of food, and not surprisingly, considering the treatment they were receiving, the dogs would stay for more.<\/p>\n

\u2018It won\u2019t ever be possible to debunk the story of Greyfriars Bobby \u2013 he\u2019s a living legend, the most faithful dog in the world, and bigger than all of us.\u2019 Dr Bondeson added.<\/p>\n

But what do you think? Is the story of Bobby true or does this new information hint at a Victorian money making scheme? Let us know in the comments…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Greyfriars Bobby is known around the world as the epitome of man’s best friend, not budging from his masters grave from the day of his burial in 1858 up until his own passing in 1872. The story is well known in Scotland and around the world, through several books and films, particularly the\u00a01961 Walt Disney […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":53199,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[67,7,17],"tags":[241,1080,718],"class_list":["post-53104","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-edinburgh-scottish-cities","category-scottish-history","category-scottish-myths","tag-edinburgh","tag-greyfriars-bobby","tag-greyfriars-kirkyard"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/project1-m9gb2xku8.live-website.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53104","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/project1-m9gb2xku8.live-website.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/project1-m9gb2xku8.live-website.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/project1-m9gb2xku8.live-website.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/project1-m9gb2xku8.live-website.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=53104"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/project1-m9gb2xku8.live-website.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53104\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/project1-m9gb2xku8.live-website.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=53104"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/project1-m9gb2xku8.live-website.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=53104"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/project1-m9gb2xku8.live-website.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=53104"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}