Breed Priorities – Norwich Terrier

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234 – August, 2026

By Nikki Riggsbee

The Norwich Terrier was developed in the late 1800s in a rural region of eastern England, an area which includes the town of Norwich, located in Norfolk county. It included a mix of several breeds with the intent to produce a compact working terrier for hunting small game. It was originally called Cantab, Trumpington, and Jones Terrier. “Jones” was the name of an influential breeder who sent the first of the breed to the United States.

Originally, the breed included both the prick-eared and drop-eared varieties. It was first recognized in England in 1932. AKC accepted the breed in 1936. In England, the breed was divided into Norwich (prick-ear) and Norfolk (drop-ear) Terriers–two separate breeds–in 1964. AKC followed by recognizing the two as separate breeds in 1979. After the split, the two breeds had one AKC parent club called the Norwich and Norfolk Terrier Club. In 2009, the members voted to establish two separate parent clubs–one for each of the two breeds.

Thirty-three breed experts were invited to take a survey on the priorities on Norwich Terriers when evaluating them for the breed ring. Seventeen agreed to do so. Thirteen completed surveys arrived by the deadline. The participants averaged twenty-seven years in the breed. Nine of the group were judges and had been approved to judge the breed for over thirteen years on average. Most of them have judged the Norwich Terrier national specialty and other specialties for the breed.

Norwich Terrier Virtues

The survey included a list of desired characteristics taken from the AKC Norwich Terrier breed standard for the experts to rank from the most important to least important. Below are the virtues in sequence by the average of the experts’ ranks.

Click here to read the complete article
234 – August, 2026

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