A story in Plutarch's life of Alcibiades tells of the statesman owning a large, handsome dog whose tail Alcibiades cut off so as to invoke pity from the Athenians and distract them from his worse deeds. The broken tail of this sculpture led Jennings to link it to this story, calling it "the dog of Alcibiades";The similar dogs in the Vatican Museums have unbroken tails; they were also found at Monte Cagnuolo, by Gavin Hamilton in 1774, "within the precincts of the villa of Antoninus Pius", according to Sir Henry Ellis, The Townley Gallery of Classical Sculpture at the British Museum, vol. 1 1846:302, Rm VI, no 52 (A group of two grayhounds at play). under this title a pair of copiesThe design was reversed to make a pair. in Portland stone were installed by Robert Adam at Newby Hall, Yorkshire, about 1780, and in the later 19th century a pair in cast stone were set in the gardens at Basildon Park, Berkshire.John P.S. Davis, Antique Garden Ornament, 1991:101ff. A 19th-century pair carved in serpentine were sold by Bonham's, London, in 2005.Auction of 22 November 2005, illustrated
