[126]. Iliad, xxi. 132.
[127]. Pausanias, lib. iii. cap. 20, viii. 7.
[128]. Gardner, Journal of Hellenic Studies, vol. v. p. 130.
Homer’s description of the Troad as ‘rich in horses’ has been very scantily justified by the results of underground exploration. Few of the animal’s bones were found at Hissarlik, none at the neighbouring Hanai-Tepe.[[129]] Yet every Trojan at the present day is a born rider.[[130]] Locomotion on horseback is universal, at all ages, and for both sexes. Priam himself could scarcely now be accommodated with a mule-cart. He should leave the Pergamus, if at all, mounted in some fashion on the back of a steed.
[129]. Calvert, in Schliemann’s Ilios, p. 711.
[130]. Virchow, Abhandlungen Berlin. Acad. 1879, p. 62.
The author of the Iliad, however, was no equestrian. His knowledge of horses was otherwise acquired. But how intimate and accurate that knowledge was, one example may suffice to show. A thunderstorm, sent by Zeus in tardy fulfilment of his promise to Thetis, caused a panic among the Greeks; the bravest yielded to the contagion of fear; there was a sauve qui peut to the ships. In the wild rout,
Gerenian Nestor, aged prop of Greece,
Alone remained, and he against his will,
His horse sore wounded by an arrow shot