The geographical origin of Canis familiaris has been an issue of some contention in the canine genomics community. There are conflicting opinions as to whether domestication occurred in the Middle East, South East Asia or Africa. Subtle interpretation of the genomic clues provides evidence for all stances. What is clear is that the domestic dog has a fascinating genomic architecture that has arisen from its unique population history in collaboration with humans. This unique genomic architecture and a suite of state of the art genomic tools means that the canine is one of the most successful organisms to use for Mendelian trait mapping. Through genomics we can see the effects of recent human-made selective sweeps and can discover how relatively few genomic changes may result in the multitude of diverse phenotypes that we observe in dogs today.