Horses in History

 The Dog May Be Man’s Best Friend,
but It Was the Horse that Built Civilization!

    “History was written on the back of the horse,” according to an inscription at The Horse Park in Kentucky. Horse lovers do not need to be reminded how much human beings owe to equus caballus, but to the general population, civilization’s debt is perhaps not immediately apparent. A comparison of civilizations that had horses with civilizations that did not soon makes it clear that human history, at least in Eurasia, would have been profoundly different were it not for the horse.

    A prime example is the entire Western Hemisphere, which was horse-free as of 30-40,000 years ago for reasons as yet unknown. One of the consequences was that its native populations remained scattered, sparse and overwhelmingly in the hunter-gatherer stage of development. The most culturally and socially complex civilizations were those of the Incas, Mayans, and Aztecs. Although successful as warriors, they could not spread their knowledge terribly far, since they lacked swift, agile animals like horses to carry them and their ideas to the rest of the Americas. As accomplished as they were, they ultimately were no match for the mounted conquistadores.

    Other horseless parts of the world, such as Australia and sub-Saharan Africa, provide similar examples of restricted human mobility and development.

By Melinda Maidens

BUCEPHALUS

Bucephalus was the horse of Alexander the Great. He was said to be black with a white star and one blue eye.

Alexander was 10 or 12 years old, when the horse was offered to King Philip II. However the king was not interested, because Bucephalus was said to be afraid of his own shadow and therefore untameable and useless. Alexander was very interested and made a deal with the horse-dealer: Bucephalus was very expensive, but the deal was that Alexander only had to pay for the horse if he failed to tame him.
Alexander was apparently very calm and spoke soothingly to the horse, turning him toward the sun, so he couldn´t see his shadow and he managed to tame him.

Bucephalus carried Alexander through many battles and was much loved by him.

Bucephalus died in June, 326BC, after being wounden in the Battle of Hydaspes. He was said to be between 28 and 30 years old at the time of his death.

Alexander gave Bucephalus a funeral worthy of a king and founded a city in honour of hin - Bucephela.

A statue of Alexander on Bucephalus. Photo Credit: WikipediA

INCITATUS

Incitatus was the name of Roman emperor Caligula’s favored horse. Some have indicated that the horse was attended to by eighteen servants, and was fed oats mixed with gold flake; according to Suetonius’s Lives of the Twelve Caesars, Incitatus had a stable of marble, with an ivory manger, purple blankets and a collar of precious stones. Suetonius wrote also that Caligula planned to make Incitatus a consul. Caligula even procured him a wife, a mare named Penelope. It has also been said Caligula claimed his horse to be a ‘combination of all the gods’ and to be worshiped as such.

The horse would also “invite” dignitaries to dine with him, and had a house with full complement of servants to entertain such guests.

Historical revisionists like Anthony A. Barrett in Caligula: The Corruption of Power (Yale, 1990), question the negative portrait of Caligula. They ascribe Caligula’s treatment of Incitatus as a way of ridiculing and angering the Senate, rather than a proof of his insanity. They suggest that later historians like Suetonius and Dio Cassius, who wrote centuries later, were motivated by the politics of their times and that their histories were distorted by the desire to include more colorful, but perhaps less reliable sources.

The word “Incitatus” is a Latin adjective, which in English would be translated as “rapid” or “speedy”.

MARENGO

Marengo was the famous war mount of Napoleon. Named after the Battle of Marengo, through which he carried his rider safely, Marengo was imported to France in 1799 as a 6-year-old. The gray Arabian was probably bred at the famous El Naseri Stud. Although small (only 14.1 hh, fitting his allegedly diminutive rider well) he was a reliable, steady, and courageous mount.

Marengo was wounded eight times in his career, and carried the Emperor in the battles of Austerlitz, Jena, Wagram, and Waterloo. He also was frequently used in the 80 mile gallops from Valladolid to Burgos, which he often completed in 5 hours. As one of 52 horses in Napoleon’s personal stud, Marengo fled with these horses when it was raided by Russians in 1812, surviving the retreat from Moscow. However, the stallion was captured in 1815 at the Battle of Waterloo by Lord Petre.

Petre brought the horse back to England and sold him on to General J.J. Angerstein of the Grenadier Guards. Marengo stood at stud (unsuccessfully) at New Barnesl, near Ely, at the age of 27. He eventually died at the old age of 38, and his skeleton (minus a hoof) was placed on display at the National Army Museum in Chelsea, London. The hoof was given to the officers of the Brigade of Guards by General Angerstein as a snuff box.

It should be stated here, that if you read Jill Hamilton´s book “Marengo, the myth of Napoleons horse”, there is no evidence anywhere, that Napoleon in fact had a horse called Marengo. The name Marengo is not mentioned anywhere in the French military og historic archives. So Marengo might actually just be………..a myth!

Napoleon had more than 150 horses, many of which died under him in battle. Two of the most used horses were Ali and Tauris.

Source and photo: WikipediA

COPENHAGEN

Lord Wellington, Arthur Wellesley (the 1st Duke of Wellington), who beat Napoleon at Waterloo, had a horse called Copenhagen. Copenhagen was a large, bay gelding, very calm and steady. Wellington rode Copenhagen at the battle of Waterloo and the horse supposedly retired with Wellington later.

TRAVELLER

 General ROBERT E. LEE led the forces of the Confederacy in the American Civil War. Lee’s horse TRAVELLER became a familiar and beloved figure among Confederate troops as he carried Lee on the war’s many long campaign marches. After the war Lee took Traveller with him into retirement, and the horse was finally buried near Lee’s tomb on the campus of Washington and Lee University.

Source: Who2?

COMANCHE

Comanche was an Army horse, and he was the only US survivor of the of Little Big Horn, also known as Custer´s Last Stand. Comanche belonged to one of Custer´s officers, Miles Keough, who had bought him for 90 Dollars. Comanche was found 2 days after the battle, hurt but alive and he was nursed back to health.

Source: Who2?

NATIVE AMERICAN INDIANS

The history of the American Indian Horse is a long and colorful one. It is generally agreed by historians that the Spanish brought the horse to the new world in the 1500s.
These horses were a mixture of Barb, Arabian and Andalusian blood and were considered the best horses in the world at that time. The horse was indispensable to the conquest of Mexico by Cortez. Indians of that era had never seen horses and to them the horse and rider team were a godlike being.
To try and keep this belief, it was illegal for some years for an Indian to ride a horse much less own one. However, in time, with the spread of the horse and the Spanish ranchos, the Indian did acquire this “Big Dog” or “God Dog” for their own. The acquisition of the horse completely changed the Plains Indians’ way of life, transforming them from plodding pedestrians to nomadic hunters and warriors.
The horse brought about a culture totally dependant upon themselves. Before the coming of the horse, the Indian tribes had used dogs for carrying small portable shelters; after the horse arrived the portable shelters became large decorative tipis.
Hunting took on a different form also. Before the horse the primary way of hunting was to run a herd of game over a cliff. After the arrival of the horse the Indians could hunt from horseback, choosing only the most desirable of targets for their prey.

Horse stealing between the tribes became the number one sport on the plains and was considered an honorable way for a young warrior to gain experience and fame. Horses meant wealth to the Plains tribes and were used extensively for barter and gifts.
Many religious ceremonies were based on the horse and its contribution to the life of the Indian. One of the most interesting was the horse medicine cult practiced by most Plains tribes. The Oglala Dakota tribe had an elaborate horse medicine cult which included a dance in imitation of horses. The Oglala used horse medicine to influence the outcome of horse races, to cure sick and wounded horses, to calm a fractious horse and to make broodmares have fine foals. Horse medicine men and women were mong the most respected members of their tribes.
In 1888, noted western artist and writer Frederic Remington said of the horse, “One thing is certain; of all the remnants the Spaniard has left to glorify his reign in America, there will be none more worthy than his horse … the Spaniard’s horses may be found today in countless thousands, from the city of the Montezumas to the regions of perpetual snow; they are grafted into our equine wealth and make an important impression on the horse of the country. They have borne the Moor, the Spanish conqueror, the Indian, the mountain man, and the vaquero through all the glories of their careers.” — HORSES OF THE PLAINS, Century Magazine.
One of the most colorful episodes in the long career of the Indian Horse was the gathering of millions of wild Longhorn Cattle off the Texas ranges after the War Between the States. They swam every river from Texas to Canada, enduring stampedes, tornadoes, hailstorms, and freezing blizzards. They did it all wbile foraging on grass and brush without grain, and they came through it ready for more. And most of them weren’t much larger than the Longhorns they drove.
The United States Army found, in its attempt to conquer the Indian, that the only way to effectively control these people was to take their horses away from them. Repeated instances of complete massacre of Indian horse herds is documented evidence - mute testimony to the toughness of this breed. They were better than anything the cavalry could put up against them.
The Indian Horse has contributed to the making of a number of American breeds. The Morgan, Quarter Horse, American Saddlebred, and the Tennessee Walker are only a few, and most of the color breeds trace their ancestry back to the Indian Horse — the Paint, Palomino, Appaloosa and Buckskin to name some.

Source: The American Indian Horse Registry