Roman horses

[Caius Fabius]

OOOPS! As any OSU student and fan will tell you Oklahoma State University, with their excellent veterinary school, is not Oklahoma University, their fiercest rival in collegate sports!

I take my sick longhorns and llamas and sheep to OSU veterinary hospital when the local DVM cannot help them. I got one of my advanced degrees in ancient history from OSU, so I had to mention this otherwise insignificant point of fact.

[Primitivus]

In the Netherlands archaeologists have found horseskeletons of which the heights measure from 110 - 160 (!) cm. Therefore I think that any horse within these would be ok. The Romans have used a variety of breeds and types.
Arriana
(Annelies Koolen)

Welcome, Annelies.

Quite a range. I would think that there would be significant variety throughout the empire, as a fully standardized breeding system (even if everyone agreed upon the ideal breed) would have been extremely difficult to create and maintain. It is logical that different types of horses would be predominant in different regions. Still, that's quite a range for adult horses dated to the Roman era in a single region.

[Arriana]

You mean not in Europe as opposed to not existing right? I'll agree that the Arabian wasn't really imported to Europe until the spread of Islam but they were in use in many areas that Rome conquered. Plus they were cross-bred into many other breeds so Arabian blood probably filtered into Europe long before the actual horses got there.

Hi Deb,

this is the exact point: there is no evidence for the cross-breeding of Arabian horses nor any evidence that this breed already existed in Arabia in Roman times, at least not from the ancient sources or other I have read the last couple of years.

In fact, not even my beloved TB (= Thoroughbred) may have come forth from what we nowadays call Arabian horses, but from Balkan horses like the Byerley Turk called 'Arabian' horses because they came from the Ottoman Empire which was called 'Arabian' for convenience. Arabian horses seem to have originated in Egypt not Arabia. You can read about this in the book called 'The Byerley Turk' on Ottoman warhorses. As you may well know The Byerley Turk was one of the three foundation sires of the TB.

Nevertheless I am still in the dark about Libyan horses. Ann Hyland is all too much of an Arabian lover in my opinion (her book 'Equus - the horse in the Roman world' is very 'pro-Arabian') and she claims the Libyan horse to be of Arabian origin or even that the Libyan horse should equal the Arabian horse ('Egyptian' in terms of the above). Unfortunately there is no historical evidence of this being true. Or am I mistaken about this?

greets,

Annelies

[Peroni]

Hi Annelies,

In the Netherlands archaeologists have found horseskeletons of which the heights measure from 110 - 160 (!) cm. Therefore I think that any horse within these would be ok.

Is there any way we can be certain that these larger horses were for cavalry riding and not used solely as draft animals for carts etc?

[Primitivus]

Is there any way we can be certain that these larger horses were for cavalry riding and not used solely as draft animals for carts etc?

Excellent point. And the horses of that era carried smaller loads (i.e. riders) than their descendants in successive centuries. Some of us can (unfortunately) say "I'm twice the man my great-grandfather was".

[Caius Fabius]

Draft horses just don't make good sense as a rule. Larger horses eat more, and oxen and mules (and slaves) will do more work with less downtime than a draft horse. In only a few cases would the expense of keeping draft horses be acceptable, even through the Medieval times. If you had a large horse, it was probably used for carrying a heavily armored human.

We do have some folks here who disk, plow and harvest using draft horses, either for religious reasons or to maintain the skills of the past, but it isn't economical, even today with lower feed prices. Big horses pulling beer wagons and heavy transport were not as efficient during the Roman times as using water transportation, which was usually available.

Where would you find draft horses in use, and what would they be doing? The Roman plow works better with a shorter animal, most carts were small, mines and quarries used small donkeys, horses and small mules.... wagons were drawn by oxen, (even the 1800's western migration in the USA usually used oxen drawn wagons, horses were for riding or light transport.)

I would suspect that the use of large horses was constrained to military riding, just from the economic costs of maintaining the larger breed.

[Peroni]

Very concise Charles. Laudes to you!

[Primitivus]

I would suspect that the use of large horses was constrained to military riding, just from the economic costs of maintaining the larger breed.

Very reasonably argued. Thank you.

[Arriana]

According to the data I have received from archaeologists the Roman army explicitly used the larger animals for cavalry purposes - either riding or pulling. The bones of smaller horses were found outside the limes, the average cavalry horse found at sites near the Roman camps measured about 140 - 145 cm.
Tacitus and Caesar comment on the smaller Germanic horses as being ugly and inferior to the larger Roman horses. Archaeologists have found that the Roman army was indeed used to larger horses, in Southern Europe and Asia for example the Persian Nisaian horse was highly prized and must have been 160 cm. Also large horses had more status in Roman society. The larger horses came into Northern Europe with the Roman army, but the native peoples apparently kept using their own smaller breeds.
Columella and Varro are very usable sources, according to them there were three purposes for horses in the Roman Empire: the best horses were to be armyhorses or circushorses, the 'moderate' horses are used at stud for mulebreeding and the inferior horses are used as draft horses on farms.

Maybe another point to consider: the horses on service in the limes-area might not have been used in battle as much as we think. In the emperial times cavalry is more and more used as a patrol service along the border instead of a true shock cavalry on the battlefield. To keep horses and riders in good condition the cavalry exercised in equestrian tournaments on training grounds and performed on cavalry shows. Larger horses were ofcourse more attractive to watch than smaller ones. Furthermore I would think that the costs of maintaining horses and the daily training and exercise they need would outrule the possibility of them being used as draft horses.

Regards,
Annelies

[richsc]

I understand that Roman horse collars choked the animals, and that they did not have a modern collar that would allow the animals to be used for draft purposes. They are shown pulling light carriages and carts, but never for draft. Oxen are always shown, as they could take the inefficient collars.

[Arriana]

Yes, indeed, heavy loads could not be pulled by horses because of the inefficient collar which choked the longnecked horses. Only the Chinese used breaststraps which allowed the horses to throw in their weight and it was not until the tenth century that the 'modern' breaststrap came into use in Western civilisation.

I just found that in 1975 archaeologists have unearthed a horseskeleton with a height of 150 cm in Buhen, Egypt dating from the second millennium BC. Therefore I think that larger horses were no exception in the Roman army, even the republican, but I am working on this subject in my thesis and I feel I cannot conclude anything decisive yet.

Annelies

[Primitivus]

...but I am working on this subject in my thesis and I feel I cannot conclude anything decisive yet.

I am looking forward to hearing more on the subject in the future, Annelies.

[Lepidina]

but from Balkan horses like the Byerley Turk called 'Arabian' horses because they came from the Ottoman Empire which was called 'Arabian' for convenience.

Ah, that makes sense now. Kind of like how a lot of non-woven fabrics got lumped into "knitting" when they are actually other forms of needlework. (Another subject entirely!)

I don't know that much about Arabs but I know there are at least two types: Egyptian and Polish arabs. Egyptians arabs tend to have flatter backs and be lankier while Polish arabs are chunkier and more square. The chunkier frame is more condusive to carrying heavy men, esp. in armor which. And I think the Royal Armory at Leeds uses like Polish draft horses for their demos since they are more typical of what medieval warhorses would have been like (Small and stocky). So same area of the world more or less as the Ottoman empire.

Do you know when horses were domesticated in Europe? For example, were the European pony/horse breeds domesticated about the same time the Egyptians started using horses for chariots or do we know?

Also, 160cm is about 15'3, which is tall for a horse back then but still relatively small for horses nowadays. 150cm is about 14'3 or about an inch over the technical height of a pony which is 14'2. Horses that average 16hh and taller are still a modern development. Rev War and US Civil War cav still used horses that were between 15-16hh.

[Arriana]

Hi Deb,

the domestication of the horse first took place in the Near East around 3000 BC. In the case of Egypt I am not certain yet at what time they domesticated horses, some scholars even say they did not have horses until the Hyksos invasions, but from the Buhen horse found in Egypt (of which I spoke earlier) you might conclude they must have had horses from the very beginning.

Scholars tend to think that the European pony breeds were domesticated in the late Bronze Age (say around 1500 - 1000 BC).

The Arabian horses we now know of we're bred in the Middle East (Iran, Iraq, Egypt, etc.) from the 8th Century AD. Before that time there were probably Barb horses, but that still doesn't explain why the Arabian horses differ so much in skeleton (i.e. they have 17 ribs instead of 18 ) from all other breeds in the world. The Equus Caballus Libycus according to findings in Newstead dating from 1st Century BC has the wellknown Arabian 'dish' in his head and might as well be a forefather of the Egyptian/African Arabian horse or a Barb horse. These horses were found in a Roman army camp in England.

I am not an insider to Arabian horses but there are many different strains of Arabs around. The original Arab horse is called Asil, but in Iraq they call the original Arab Khamsa. The Northafrican tribes did not possess Khamsa in the 7th Century AD. Probably the Polish, French, Russian Arabians which are used as race and showhorses nowadays came from imported Arabians and have not much to do with this more original breed of desert-Arabians. By the way, the French Arabians used on the track look much like Thoroughbreds and story goes that at some point in recent history Thoroughbreds have been used to make these Arabians speedier.

There are also people who say the Iberian breeds were the origins of the Northafrican Barb horses which travelled back to Spain with the Moors in 7th century AD and were 'discovered again' then.

I found that an Austrian scholar has translated a 13th Century Cilician source on equine veterinary science. It is only available in German, I ordered it yesterday and it might be very interesting!

Still got a lot of work to do on this subject , I feel it has a lot to do with training the Roman cavalry (the primary subject of my thesis)...

Hope you people are not bored by now.....

cheers,

Annelies

[bachmat66]

In fact, not even my beloved TB (= Thoroughbred) may have come forth from what we nowadays call Arabian horses, but from Balkan horses like the Byerley Turk called 'Arabian' horses because they came from the Ottoman Empire which was called 'Arabian' for convenience. Arabian horses seem to have originated in Egypt not Arabia. You can read about this in the book called 'The Byerley Turk' on Ottoman warhorses. As you may well know The Byerley Turk was one of the three foundation sires of the TB.

Nevertheless I am still in the dark about Libyan horses. Ann Hyland is all too much of an Arabian lover in my opinion (her book 'Equus - the horse in the Roman world' is very 'pro-Arabian') and she claims the Libyan horse to be of Arabian origin or even that the Libyan horse should equal the Arabian horse ('Egyptian' in terms of the above). Unfortunately there is no historical evidence of this being true. Or am I mistaken about this?

greets,

Annelies

hello,
I am reading the new Hyland book - the Ancient Horse - should have been titled Middle Eastern Ancient Horse from lets say 1700BC to 300BC. Even there she is very pro-Arabians (got my copy of Equus too, I actually like it).
American horsewoman and trainer Dr (she is a former Smithsonian paleontologist) Deb Bennett wrote 'The Conquerors' some 10 years ago where she talks about the origin of hot-blood (for the lack of a better term) horses in Europe, Middle East and Western Asia. She, amongst other things, uses the genetic studies of another American scientist Dr Gus Cochran that tend to prove that there was not Arabian horse prior to Islam conquests of Egypt and Sassanian Iran.
As per Thoroughbred origin - the horses involved must been definitely the so called Turkish horses from Asia Minor and Thrace (Rumelia), Persian horses from Saafid Iran and Central Asia, and Barbs from Maghreb - I do not think they were Arabians in a sense of the 19th century Arabians.
De la Gueriniere writes that both Turks and TBs did not qualify to be used in the high school of equestrian arts of the 18th century, perhaps indicating their common origin (faults with conformation etc)
The Poles got their first Arabs from the spoils of their victory at Vienna (1683) but the real breeding did not start until late 18th century or even later when the Arabian horses were imported directly from Syria and Arabian Peninsula exclusively.
Darius