SOLVED. Children's dog mythology book, man kills his dog for attacking the baby but the dog was actually protecting it. [s]

[Maple]

This was a nonfiction children's book on dogs. It had a focus on dog biology, dogs in mythology, and a short encyclopedia of dog breeds in the back. I read this between 2006 and 2010 and it couldn't have been over 200 pages long (most likely was under 100 pages even), it was fairly large, had a dark blue cover, a red coated dog's head on the cover, and the word "DOG" as part of the title. Specific details I remember are a section in the front about the dog skeletal system, teeth, and muscular system (mostly large diagrams) and a family tree of sorts showing how dogs have evolved and split into different species (with some related species having gone extinct). There was also a mythology/history section with some specific mentions of Greyfriars Bobby, Laika the soviet space dog, Egyptian mythology for dogs (how they would mummify and bury their dogs with them and had the belief that dogs lead the dead to the afterlife), and a story where a man leaves his dog alone with his son so he can go hunt but when he comes back, the son is missing and it looks like there was a fight, so he kills his dog thinking that it killed the baby, but then he finds his son unharmed and a dead snake beside him and realizes his dog was protecting the baby from the snake.

[Rainbowheart]

The last story you mentioned is the legend of Saint Guinefort.

The Best-Ever Book of Dogs mentions Laika, Guinefort, and Greyfriars Bobby, but it doesn't tell the complete story about Guinefort.

"In France, a similar legend was told of the Greyhound Guinefort, who saved his master’s child from a great snake. Local people declared the dog a saint — the only dog saint on record. For centuries, his feast day was celebrated on 22 August, despite official Church disapproval."

[Maple]

Rainbowheart wrote: "The last story you mentioned is the legend of Saint Guinefort.

The Best-Ever Book of Dogs mentions Laika, Guinefort, and Greyfriars Bobby, but it doesn't tell the complete story abo..."

Thank yo so much!! I've been looking for this book for literal years since I lost it omg!!

[Rainbowheart]

Awesome, glad that was the right one!