The Chiweenie is believed to have been first bred in the 1990s; there is very little history about them. There is, however, a great amount of history about their two parent breeds: the Chihuahua and the Dachshund.
The Chihuahua is a breed named after the region in Mexico from which it is said to have been first noted. Artifacts found in Mexico from the 9th century A.D. depict the Chihuahua from that time, and one of the oldest archaeological dig sites was in Cholula (not far from Mexico City) in which was found art from around or prior to 1500 A.D. that depicted a dog resembling a Chihuahua. A number of theories claim that the Chihuahua may have come from a much larger dog that was bred down for size, or that the Chinese Crested dog brought by the Spanish from China may have been interbred with a native dog, or that the breed is actually of European descent and came from Malta — this last theory being due to the relatively unique soft spot (called a "natural molera") on the back of the dog's head. Yet another theory is that a very small dog already existed in the North American region as far back as 3,000 B.C., according to a one Dr. William Web who dug up 21 small dog bodies from a two-acre grave site in Kentucky.
Chihuahuas had been introduced to the southwestern U.S. in the 18th century, but they weren't popular because they were too small to be useful on farms where the tasks of livestock-herding, cart-pulling and protection against predators was best undertaken by much larger dogs. Once the American urban/suburban-bound middle class exploded in the 1960s, however, the Chihuahua became popular because its small size allowed it to adapt easily to apartment living. It is one of the oldest registered breeds in the United States, as the American Kennel Club (AKC) was only 20 years old when it officially recognized the Chihuahua in 1904.
The Dachshund, on the other hand, was bred for a specific task: hunting badgers. With its distinct tubelike body, short yet powerful legs and remarkably sharp sense of smell, the dog was even named in German for what it did best; dachshund means "badger dog." Furthermore, the size of the dog (and the hole it could enter) determined how they were categorized within the breed. The standard Dachshund (Normalgrossteckel) is the largest of the three, whereas the miniature Dachshund is comprised of the other two categories: the dwarf Dachshunds (zwergteckel) were those that measured approximately 11.8 inches around the chest, and the rabbit Dachshunds (kaninchenteckel) were those with a chest that measured about 13.8 inches in circumference.
Although Dachshunds have not been around nearly as long as the Chihuahua, they too have been featured extensively in art through the ages. As far back as the 15th century (as well as the 16th and 17th centuries), they were regularly featured in illustrations depicting them at work as they burrowed into badger, rabbit and fox holes to flush out their prey and expose them to hunters. (There are also cave and tomb paintings from thousands of years ago that some claim depict the dog as well, but the Dachshund of today appears to have originated in Germany about 500 years ago.)
Dachshunds became very popular in the U.S. during the 18th and 19th centuries, and the first kennel club devoted to Dachshunds was founded in 1881. The first Dachshund to be registered with the AKC was four years later in 1885 (the year the club recognized the breed); his name was Dash. Just before the start of WWI, the Dachshund was one of the top 10 most popular breeds in the U.S. and UK, but due to the intimate association with Germany, that popularity declined precipitously until 1940 — just in time for the second such war and another period of derision due to the dog's unwitting heritage. It didn't take long after WWII for the Dachshund to again be popular. In 1972, the breed became the Summer Olympics' mascot (in Munich).
