The horse : with a treatise on draught / by William Youatt.

  • William Youatt
Date:
1859
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The horse : with a treatise on draught / by William Youatt. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    exposed was very early adopted, and the heel of it was, occasionally at least, armed with a spur. The horses’ feet were unshod, the paved or flinty roads, which are now so destructive to the feet, being in a manner unknown. Occasionally, however, from natural weakness of the foot, or from travelling too iar or too fast over the causeways, lameness then, as now, occurred. In order to prevent this, the Greeks and the Romans were accustomed to fasten a sort of sandal or stocking, made of sedges twisted together like a mat, or else of leather, and where the owner could afford it, strengthened with plates of iron, and sometimes adorned with silver and even with gold, as was the case with the horses of Poppasa and Nero. ^ There was a peculiarity in the Greek mode of riding, at least with regard to the cavalry horses, and, sometimes, those used for pleasure. Two or three of them were tied together by their bridles, and the horseman, at full speed, leaped from one to another at his pleasure. This might occa- sionally be useful; when one horse was tired or wounded, the warrior might leap upon another; but he would be so hampered by the manage- ment of all of them, and the attention which he was compelled to pay to them all, that it never became the general way of riding or fighting ; nor was it practised in any other country. Homer, m his 15th Iliad, alludes to it as a feat of skill attempted in sport. The following is a translation of the passage : — “ Just as a skilful horseman riding four chosen horses along a public road to some great city, where his course is to terminate, the whole town assembles to behold him, and gaze upon him with wondei and applause ; while he leaps with ease from the back of one horse to another, and flies along with them.” The Greeks must have carried their management of the horse to a very high state of perfection ; and the Grecian horse must have been exceedingly docile, when exhibitions of this kind could take place. . It was, however, to the draught of the chariot that this animal w as principally devoted in some other countries, and among the Greeks in the early period of their history. No mention is made of a single horseman on either side, during the ten years’ siege of Troy; but the warriors all fought on foot or in chariots. . The chariots were simple in their structure, open at the back, and partly on the sides ; and containing the driver in the front, and the warrior standing on a platform, usually somewhat elevated. These vehicles seem to have been rarely brought into collision with each other; but they wero driven rapidly over the field, the warrior hurling his lances on eitliei side, or alighting when he met with a foe worthy of his attack. These chariots were°not only contrived for service, but were often most splendidly and expensively ornamented. They were the prize of the conqueror. Some- times they were drawn by three horses; but the third was a spare one in case either of the others should be tired or wounded. Some had lour horses yoked abreast; such was the chariot of Hector. The charioteer, although at the time inferior to, or under the command of the warrior, was seldom or never a menial. He was often the intimate friend of the warrior ; thus Nestor, and even Hector, are found acting as charioteers. When not the personal friend of the warrior, lie was usually a charioteer by profession ; and drove where lie was directed. Occasional mention is made of the currus falcati, chariots with aimed instruments in the form of scythes, projecting from the axles of the wheels, by means of which whole ranks might be mown down at once. I hey were confined, however, to the more barbarous nations, and were used neither by the Greeks nor the Romans. They were advantageous only on tolerably open and level ground; and it not unfrcquently happened
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