Native Australians kept captive dingos as companions, watchdogs, and even as living blankets, giving rise to the expression “five-dog night” to mean a very cold night.
“Guns, Germs, and Steel” (ch. 15), Jared Diamond
Diamond goes to five; the everyday expression is “three dog night,” said to come from the Australian bush. The colder the night, the more dogs you need to keep warm. One dog is chilly. Three is freezing. Five means you should have stayed by the fire.
He makes this point in the context of animal domestication. Dingoes are one of the few animals kept not for food or labor, but for warmth and company. Aboriginal Australians lived in symbiosis with dingoes for thousands of years, and the dogs received scraps in exchange for guarding and, literally, warmth.
Curiously, the phrase outlived its origin. The American rock band from the seventies was called just that: Three Dog Night. And in Fallout 3, the radio host from post-apocalyptic Washington is named Three Dog, and he broadcasts from a studio in the irradiated ruins. The expression is used even where nobody has ever seen a dingo.
