A detail from a 1615 painting by Jan Brueghel the Elder shows multicolored guinea pigs.
Painting by Jan Brueghel the Elder, Stapleton Collection/Corbis

South American rodents raised by several social classes, study suggests.
Christine Dell'Amore
National Geographic News
Published February 7, 2012

When Spanish conquistadors brought guinea pigs from South America to Europe, the tiny "curiosities" were bred as pets across a wide swath of Elizabethan societal classes, a new study suggests.

The evidence comes from a guinea pig skeleton discovered in 2007 in the backyard cellar of a former middle-class house in Mons, Belgium, once part of the Spanish Empire.

Radiocarbon dating of the bones revealed that this guinea pig lived between the end of the 16th and the beginning of the 17th centuries—very soon after the Spanish arrived in South America, said study leader Fabienne Pigière, of the Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences in Brussels.

Guinea pig bones are rare in the European archaeological record, which left scientists wondering what purpose the animals originally served when they arrived on the continent, according to the study.

More: http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2012/01/120207-guinea-pigs-europe-south-america-pets-animals/