Dog

Dogs are a species of canines within the world of Wurr. They inhabit the majority of the world, as its dominant species. They are incredibly diverse in appearance and rich in culture. Dogs are absent from The Crater, and from areas inhabited by wolves.

Physiology
Dogs move on four legs, but have dexterous front paws that are capable of more movement than their real life counterparts. These "hand paws" allow them to do complex tasks, such as tie string, craft objects, build shelters, and hold items. This, combined with their extremely family-oriented lifestyles and excess social contact, is part of the reason dogs evolved to be their world's dominant species. They enjoy longer lifespans than their real life counterparts, living to an average of 20 years.

While the dogs in the universe do not have breeds as we know them in real life, each dog has its own set of traits that distinguish it from others, and those traits are often shared by family members and groups. Dogs come in all colors and patterns that real life dogs exhibit. They often remind of real-life breed traits, and are dependent on genetics.

Dogs tend to not suffer from the mutations of hellhounds, as they are not exposed to Black Touch. However, some mutations do rarely occur naturally.

Regional variants
Since dogs are the most widespread species of the world, many regional variants have emerged, each with their own known traits. As the story takes place in the land of the Woodlanders, very little of the culture of the other types of dogs is known.
 * Northerners- Northerners inhabit the northmost areas of the world, known as the Reindeerlands. They tend to be short and stockily built, with long, plush fur to protect them from the cold, and are more likely to sport manes or crests of fur than other types. Some common traits are their slanted eyes, small ears, and often curly tails. Northerners are known for their bone jewelry and use of pelts. Notherners are seen as jolly and hospitable, but also hardy and stubborn. They are thought to be able to survive just about anywhere, and so "resilient like a northerner" is a common phrase.
 * Woodlanders- Woodlanders are the type of dog seen most within Wurr, and are the "standard" where the world takes place. They are mostly of a medium build, with medium length hair, round eyes, and frequently fluffy tails. They are known for many crafts, most notably working with leather, clay, and wood.
 * Southerners- Southerners are marked by their often tall, slender frames and long, tapered muzzles. They have massive ears, which can be pointed or floppy. Their fur is extremely short, due to their hot climate. They are known stereotypically to be either wealthy or merchants, or both, due to having the most advanced culture and technology of the world, though this is not necessarily true. They are known for their copper, dyes, and spices.
 * Goat people- The Goat People live in the mountainous region southeast of the land of the Woodlanders within the comic's setting. They are generally large dogs, with pointed ears and dark eyes. They consider white to be the color of good luck, and so most are known to be piebald. They domesticate and raise goats, and while they no longer have an exclusive monopoly on them, they still have a reputation of raising the highest quality goats in the world. The Goat People measure the worth of your family by how many goats you have, and so have a reputation of being arrogant. Since packs in other lands have less goats in general, these dogs tend to automatically view other types of dog as less well off, regardless of their actual wealth. They invented cheese, and are known for their music.
 * The Fishing People- Nothing is known about the Fishing People, other than at least two instances of them exist within the world.

Packs
Dogs tend to live in packs, ranging from large to very small family units. Unlike hellhounds, whose packs are comprised of multiple families and unrelated individuals, dog packs tend to be related. Dogs generally live with their families, so a dog pack is usually comprised of a dog's immediate or extended family. A couple of extended families can even live together to form small cities. It is not uncommon for a dog to leave their pack and join a neighboring pack, or bring home a mate. Other more adventurous dogs join traveling merchant packs to migrate far from home, starting new lives elsewhere.

An exception to this is merchant packs,who tend to travel, picking up members with different sets of skills, and are mostly concerned with the buying and selling of goods. A good merchant pack is expected to have one or more entertainers or storytellers. Merchant packs are composed of a wide variety of dogs from different places, and are such often the only time dogs from the North and South will ever see each other. Thus, a merchant pack entering a city can be quite a sight.

Dog packs in a large enough area will often form alliances that can be likened to small "countries". This "council of packs" will have a head or representative from each pack within it. When a decision is large enough that it will effect all or most of the packs within the alliance, the council will form a sort of court. Otherwise, each pack makes decisions on its own within its ruled territory. Oftentimes an alliance will have at least one pack that holds a very large amount of influence due to the importance of the dogs who live there, and it is on that territory the council meetings are to be held.

Packs in the North are most often led by the elders of the family. Packs in the South tend to be much, much bigger than in the North, and so their leaders tend to have much higher ranking and power. They were often referred to as "cheetahs" to underline their highness, and over the course of countless generations, the term has morphed into "tseetah".

While all packs are mostly self sufficient, some have taken on specialist arts that are useful to trade for other goods and services. Hunters, tanners, potters, and other such professions are common amongst dogs. Some packs specialize in hunting and preparation of fine furs and leather, especially the ones living in the North. Others, living in near copper mines, are often miners themselves. Packs living near oceans or other bodies of salt water may be skilled in collecting salt to sell. Others create pottery and ceramics to hold materials or build statuettes.

Beliefs
Dogs as a whole share many beliefs, such as respect for their ancestors, and the belief that hellhounds are akin to evil spirits- merciless, mindless killers who must be stopped at all costs, and that wolves are primitive savages. However, the specific customs and belief systems, such as the way they honor said ancestors, tends to vary between packs.

In the South, dogs revere cheetahs, considering them a divine animal, due to their litheness and speed, and consider being like a cheetah to be the ideal state. As they consider them to be a spiritual ancestor, being invited to a cheetah hunt is one of the highest honors a southern dog can have. Catching one with honor elevates your status to that nearing a demigod, though catching one through trickery and cheating is likely to get the perpetrator executed.

Through sexual selection and preference, this standard of beauty has, over generations, caused most dogs in the South to be slender and short-furred, though this is not result from any intentional breedings. Cheetahs are so sacred only the rulers of their packs, known as tseeta, are permitted to wear cheetah skins. The tseeta of The Copper Fields wears a trimmed fur, cut to fit, with large claws made of copper to represent the wealth of the land they rule. They have a much larger, full skin for formal occasions.

Copper & Trade
One thing they all seem to share is the use of copper as currency. The dogs are in their Copper Age, and as such it is used to trade for goods and services, to make tools, and as common pass to keep out of trouble with locals. It is extremely easy to work as a metal, as it has a low melting point and can be poured into clay casts, so it is quite popular.

It is often worn on the ears by dogs who don't own land, such as travelers, strays, and merchants, as small loops so as to be visible, or carried in a pouch. In ears, it is easily visible by dogs who own land, and a sign that the wearer is a traveler and does not intend to stay. They can also be useful as a ransom, giving any would be attackers something to take instead of the traveler's life.

Smiths are common and valued amongst dogs, and needed to work copper into such things as coins, knives, spikes, nuggets, needles, and earrings. Smiths tend to be wealthy, and wear more earrings than merchants.

In the South, copper is extremely common, so southerners tend to be known as wealthy. There are multiple copper mines in the south of the world, and at least one very wealthy area is known as The Copper Fields. It is known to be very expensive to travel through the South.

In the North, dog packs tend to have less copper, and traveling through these areas requires less copper for common pass.

As popular as copper is, this concept of money is still only used alongside traditional forms of trading and bartering. Most trading is still done between two objects, such as food, pelts, and salt, and oftentimes no copper is exchanged at all. Many dogs take up jobs as tanners, hunters, and other forms of craftsmen.

Copper as coins
As copper is used as currency, there is a consistent system that determines the value of an amount of copper. The value of each coin is determined practically- depending on what amount of other coins it can be melted down into.

The smallest unit is referred to as a fang. It is a pointed teardrop shape, about the size of a dog's canine tooth. There is a hole at the widest end to be strung and displayed as jewelry and to hold them together if there are many. The most amount of copper worn in one ear is usually equal to about one half of a fang, as anything heavier would bend the ear. Smaller loops vary in value based on weight. The larger a loop is, the lower on the ear it is held.

The next coin is referred to as a bite, and is equal in weight and value to four fangs. It is shaped as a half circle with two points on the flatter end. There is a hole at the round side of a fang.

Four bites are equal to a unit called a half knife, with a blade on one side. It resembles an axe head, and as a practical tool is used for cutting, skinning creatures, and other household work.

Two half knives can be melted into a larger unit of currency known as a knife. A knife, as a tool, is useful for things like scraping material off of skins as part of the tanning process. Holes are very uncommon on both knives and half knives.

Language and writing
Dogs communicate over short distance verbally, and over long distances by sending messages in the form of howling. For private messages, code is often used. Dogs who do not understand the code seem capable of passing it on and "writing" it down, however, even if they cannot decipher it. A dog will send a message, howling the destination and the body of the message, and other dogs from nearby packs will opt to pass it on, until it reaches the ears of its recipient.

For nonverbal communication, the dogs have a form of written language that consists of knots and loops of varying sizes tied in a string. The alphabet and structure of this language is not known. It is unknown how much of the population is able to read and write, and scribes exist within the universe for those who cannot.

Military & Law
The dogs do not appear to have a single cohesive military. However, after The Great War, multiple guard stations were posted surrounding The Crater. The only known and named station is called Bear's Rock guard station. These dogs are the first line of defense in the event of a hellhound invasion, and wear collars to mark their status as soldiers. Officers wear a copper plate on their collar to distinguish them from the rest, and the chief in turn wears a collar of sharp spikes. Male and female dogs are considered equals in the world, and thus have the same chances of being chosen for higher ranks.

Oftentimes guard stations have prisons deep within them to hold criminals, with cells mostly composed of southern blackwood. Some family packs are known to have a sort of prison system or a way to deal with their criminals. In the north, small crimes are generally dealt with within the pack, and the council of packs is rarely ever involved. In southern lands, where packs are larger and rule more centralized, the legal system is likely more standardized.

Punishments vary depending on where you are and who you are dealing with. One form of punishment for more serious crimes involves the docking of one's ears or tail. A dog's tail or ears may be removed if they commit a serious crime. They will no longer have the right or ability to hold their tail up straight, and in some places that's taken literally as a sign that individual can never become a leader- however, because they had to earn a tail docking in the first place, that is usually a given.

Besides intentional removal, a tail or ears may be lost via other means. They are very easy to grab, and can be injured or even lost completely during a fight. Others will generally regard dogs with ear or tail injuries with caution and wariness. If not a marked criminal, they could still easily be a troublemaker, getting into enough conflicts to sustain such wounds.

Some groups of dogs crop their ears as part of their culture, and it has given them quite the reputation. Most dogs are shocked at this, perceiving them as intentionally marking themselves as criminals. This reputation is something that these groups embrace rebelliously.

Trivia

 * The artist originally decided that one fang was the most a dog could carry in one ear, but after obtaining a piece of copper for herself, and feeling the weight, decided half a fang was more appropriate.