Few people familiar with dog breeds don’t recognize a Papillon when they see one, or know that the breed is known as the ‘butterfly dog’ because of those marvelous ears.

Fewer still know that the name refers specifically to an Old World butterfly.

Outside the dog world, we’d guess that most people might not know that the Papillon has another ear type, the drop-eared type known as the Phalene which means “moth.” 

But here’s fun fact that people inside the dog fancy might not know.

The AKC breed standard reads: Ears of the erect type are carried obliquely and move like the spread wings of a butterfly, but the Royal Kennel Club makes the imagery especially explicit. The British standard extends the butterfly picture beyond the ears by writing that a narrow, clearly defined white blaze on the face/head is desirable, though not essential, because it can represent the butterfly’s body between the two “wings.” From that standard: “Head markings should be symmetrical, about a narrow white, clearly defined blaze which is desirable but not essential to represent the body of a butterfly.”

Both standards also require the breed’s ears to be large, rounded at the tips and set toward the back of the head, and this matters because in the Papillon, the butterfly impression is produced by the complete combination of placement, carriage, shape, fringe and head markings—not merely by possessing two upright ears.

Images: The Papillon photo is credited to Di_Studio/iStock, while the Dryas julia butterfly image is by Manfred Richter from Pixabay. We created the overlay transparency on Canva.