During the Victorian era initially in Britain but later in the USA and Europe families used dog portraitures to show their wealth proving to their families and friends that they had enough money to not only to have a family portrait but had enough to feed an animal that provided nothing more than companionship. Dogs had only recently transitioned from solely working animals to pets and it was during this era that the first dogs were bred for aesthetic qualities not working qualities, it’s also the era where like 80% of all our modern breeds were created by crossing different landrace types that existed in their respected countries for thousands of years and closing their gene pools.