Haute couture in America owes a great debt to Her Majesty Queen Victoria. Hollywood starlets, dog breeders, and anyone else who enjoys the madness of toy Pomeranians, give homage: the dog you tote around in your little pink handbag has royal ancestry.

Born on the 24th of May, 1819, and later Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland and Empress of India, Victoria was a devoted dog fancier. Beginning at a young age, spurred along by gifts from her great grandmother Queen Charlotte, Victoria would go on to raise fifteen separate and unique breeds in her lifetime. A trip to Florence in 1888 yielded four purebred Pomeranians, the most famous among them a London Dog Show champion called Gina and a red sable called Marco. Weighing in at 12 pounds, some historians believe that Marco may have been the catalyst that led English fanciers to begin breeding them to be smaller. Today, the average Pomeranian is between 5 and 7 pounds, officially classifying them as a “toy” breed.

Victoria was also a vocal opponent of animal cruelty. “I feel so much for animals, poor confiding, faithful, kind things,” she once told her eldest daughter, “and do all I can to prevent cruelty to them which is one of the worst signs of wickedness in human nature!” Of the medical practice of vivisection, the dissection of living animals for study, she told Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli that such barbaric conventions had to be abandoned “if the nation is not to be disgraced by cruelty under the shameful plea of humanity.” While vivisection was not abolished as a result of her efforts, the attention it garnered prompted like-minded individuals to found the National Anti-Vivisection Society in 1875 (at Victoria Street in London, no less!) and they continue to push for the illegalization of the practice to this day.

Long Live the Queen!

For more information, please visit:
The National Anti-Vivisection Society